Customer Reviews

The Devil's Company: A Novel

5 star:		(27)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

One day while on vacation, I stepped into a local bookstore looking for a bit of literary adventure. I decided I wanted to read some fiction, instead of the usual history I tend to gravitate to. I randomly pulled off the shelf a book called the "Coffee Trader" by David Liss, not knowing a thing about the book or the author. The literary fates smiled upon me that day. I was amazed that a book set in 16th century Amsterdam could be so full on intrigue, suspense and absolutely thrilling to read. After that, I tracked down his other works of historical fiction, "The Conspiracy of Paper" and "The Spectacle of Corruption," and was introduced to one of the most fascinating heroes in literary fiction, Benjamin Weaver.

"The Devil's Company" the third in the Benjamin Weaver series, is a fantastic book! It follows the exploits of Benjamin Weaver, a private investigator, in London in the fall of 1722. Mr. Weaver is employed to avenge the honor of his client, through a set up in a game of chance. This is but the beginning of a tale so full of malice, intrigue and malevolent cleverness that one worries if Mr. Weaver's "derring do" will be enough to prevail. Also, I never thought the British East India Company could be such a vipers' nest of scheming. What transpires there has relevance today and illustrates that corporate perfidy is not a recent development. Mr. Weaver is compelled to go to work for "the Company" by a mysterious cabal. The stakes are incredibly high as Mr. Weaver has to sort through ever shifting facts and alliances, and his Herculean task ensnares the reader to such an extent that one is cautioned to set aside some serious reading time, lest one stay up half the night.

Mr. Liss has written a superlative book. He captures the feel and sound of 18th century London. His attention to detail and compelling story telling brings to mind Patrick O'Brian in his "Aubrey/Maturin" series, Jean-Christophe Ruffin in "The Abyssinian," or Stephen Harridans' "The Gates of the Alamo." If you enjoy a good mystery, attention to detail, a thriller, or just revel in a well written entertaining book, then "The Devil's Company" is the book

This is the third book by Liss that has featured Benjamin Weaver, a retired prize-fighter and now a `thief-taker'. The book is set in London during the 1720s and centers around the British East India Company and their bitter struggles with local silk weavers and the `wool interest'.

Weaver is forced against his will to investigate the inner doings of the Company's Craven House headquarters. He knows not for whom is working nor does he have a clear picture of what he is looking for.

I characterize the book as historical mystery rather than historical fiction with the emphasis on mystery. Liss does provide some interesting glimpses into early 18th century London, especially the Rules of the Fleet, a law-free area around Fleet Prison where debtors were free from arrest and clandestine marriages took place without banns or license. Liss mostly neglected to explore the inner workings of the British East India Company.

Liss's primary focus, however, is the mystery. The first mystery is what is it all about. Who has taken control of Weaver, why and to what end? The book only slowly yields the answers and takes so many twists and turns along the way that the surprises eventually become tedious. A good surprise or two or three is one thing, but the ploy is overworked. It hardly paid to try to figure things out because as soon as you made some progress, Liss yanks out the proverbial rug. A better book would have had fewer plot twists and more historical detail.

If you really like intricate fluid mysteries and you enjoy historical fiction, this is the book for you. 3.5 stars.

The Devil's Company is the fourth Benjamin Weaver novel; this time, it's 1722, and Weaver must take on one of the world's largest corporations: the East India Company. Hired (though that's too mile a term) by a dangerous man named Jerome Cobb, he must infiltrate the Company to steal secret documents. What happens, however, is a complicated series of treachery and deceptions--some of them at Benjamin Weaver's expense.

This is the fifth novel I've read by David Liss, and I'd definitely say that his Benjamin Weaver books are much stronger than his stand-alone book, The Whiskey Rebels. Weaver, while not sympathetic or sometimes even likable, is a compelling character. One thing you always know will happen in a book in which he's featured is that he'll get double-crossed at some point, and The Devil's Company is no exception. Liss excels at description, too, and I enjoyed his depiction of 1722 London.

The mystery itself however, is a bit predictable, and the disguises don't always hide people's identities all that well. Also, I was a little frustrated by Absalom Pepper's cotton machine mentioned in the book; it's never actually described, so that it would seem more real. The author bites off a lot in writing about the East India Company, and I wish he had described it more in this book. Nonetheless, I enjoyed the characters and most of the story. Weaver has a biting, sarcastic wit, and he had me laughing at many places in the novel; he's is the reason why I keep turning back to this series.

This book gallops along and is really quite pleasant to read about the exploits of superJew, superfighter, supersleuth Bejamin Weaver as he plays underworld chess having been manneuvered by birth and conspiracy into a game where he starts minus at least a bishop and two pawns. The texture, customs and speech of early 18th century London seem quite authentic to this Londoner.

Weaver's foes (or allies - you're never quite sure which) are everywhere from the Crown, the Crapeauds, the East India Company to . . . you name it. I'll not reveal the plot as the fun is in the reading and feeling part of the swirl of the place and times. This book is great fun to read . . .

However, the entire plot is totally ludicrous when you look at it dispassionately. For example, the initial set-up whereby Weaver falls under the manipulative control of Mr Cobb makes absolutely no sense. It is ridiculously complicated and I have to feel that the author could have found a subtler way for Weaver to fall into Cobb's net than the contorted combination of sledgehammer conspiracies that he employs.

Unfortunately, the lack of sensible plot development continues throughout the book. A further example is the bizarre history of the invisible Absalom Pepper.

The depiction of anti-semitism is a little heavy-handed but probably actually quite realistic. The irony, however, is that Britain at that time (and, of course,since) was one of the safest places in the world to be a Jew - I have some personal family knowledge of that. Also, there is a little too much ranting about the evils of corporations and capitalism for my liking.

I found the Coffee Trader by the same author to be much more plausible and at least as much fun to read. Somehow, incredible plot developments don't work for Liss as well as they do for, say, Orson Scott Card in Magic Street.

If you are interested in almost contemporary (covering the preceding 60 or so years) fiction with a strong background of conspiracy, economics, technological development and with much of the action taking place in London, I suggest reading the trilogy of Books by Neal Stephenson "The Baroque Cycle" the first volume of which is "Quicksilver" - this is 3 volumes of 1,000 pages each (sometimes marketed as 9 minivolumes). This series (which is something of a sequel to Cryptonomicon although set almost 400 years earlier) is a truly wonderful read - AS LONG AS you make it out of Boston harbor in the first 200 pages or so of the first volume (I almost didn't but persevered as I'd previously read Cryptonomicon).

Still and all, I enjoyed this book - there is just that big BUT about the whole thing.

Having got this book to review, I had to acquire the previous two books as this is the third and become acquainted with our hero... There is a trend with our hero to not have his life in his own hands. Here more than any other time we see blackmail at the root of his problems. We also see the writer use a device, now all too obvious of not beginning his story at the beginning. In each instance we have a chapter or more where we have to delve back in time by some days or weeks to find where the story begins.

We learn of life always through the first person, and perhaps that we have now a series, we will always be limited to this view. Certainly in a mystery, the first person guides us in what facts we know. The character whose eyes we share does not know any more or less than we. We also see London, a rather decrepit London through our heroes eyes. We seem to have come across a London that has gone from tolerable 100 years before when Shakespeare and Elizabeth lived to a nightmarish place. Perhaps a reason we don't have many encounters of early Georgian mysteries.

What troubles is that this book is not as strong as the previous two. There economics ruled to such an extant that the complexities while made understandable where sinuous enough that they were hard to unravel. Here, Weaver our hero, once again thrown about by more powerful forces, is clear never to be his own man and by the end of the tale we can see where the author wants to take us. Move over James Bond, your Georgian predecessor is upon the scene.

Yes as the tale continues, we see that the author would like us to find a home for his secret agent man... Oh no. Not another one. How many good series get ruined by making everyone work for the Crown? Let us have an honest series, our thieftaker is strong enough to do his work without being mixed up with the affairs of a nation.

Now can Liss deliver and find another economic concept as compelling as we had in his first two novels? Or even better, the Coffee Trader which I believe bests this also. Where Liss elevated above others is that he has the ability to grasp an economic plot device and marry it to the times and then weave the plight of the Jew in to the mix. Here, aside from a very few scenes, the need for our hero to even have been a Jew is sadly lacking. He could have been an Irish man.

Their is a last quibble also, as what is surely to be his next benefactor/nemesis, the crown, ends up knowing a fact that the three others who know (all from the second book) would not wish to reveal. So read it because you like Liss and the series, but don't look to read this on its own. For that, it is only better than average, not great.

I thoroughly enjoyed David Liss's previous books featuring Benjamin Weaver, a Jewish ex-boxer making his way as a detective in London. (And yes, I mention the religion for a reason. Judaism is part of all Liss's novels historical novels, and while it is never at the forefront of the plot, it is definitely a key component of the background.) I admit I don't remember the first two very well at all- I read them some years ago- but I do remember liking them.

David Liss knows early 18th century England well, from London's neighborhoods to the political maneuverings of the East India Company. He is also very realistic in his portrayal of characters. He does not give his characters modern sensibilities. I really appreciate that in a historical novel because frankly, that's the point of reading them. I don't need to read about 18th century London if everyone populating the book's pages has the same thought process that I do.

One thing that did seem to ring false, though, was the East India Company corporate slant. I understand that the East India Company was the first multi-national corporation complete with stockholders. I also understand that the directors of the firm, and people further down the ladder, were ruthless in their methods to get as much profit as possible. However, I think that Liss put a slightly too modern slant on the way everyone reacted to the company in the book. It was pretty clear that Liss was writing to an audience that is currently going through a global recession in which corporate greed features prominently. It's all well to assume people now should know about corporate responsibility and the effects capitalism can have in many sectors. But I don't quite buy into the way everyone in 1722 seemed just to know what would happen to the East India Company, Britain, and the world, when it was the first-ever corporation.

That concern didn't hamper my enjoyment of the novel, though. It is fast-paced, populated with interesting characters, and fun to read. Another historical mystery winner.

[...]

American author David Liss has had continued success and critical praise for his work ever since he won the Edgar Award for Best First Novel with A CONSPIRACY OF PAPER. In his fifth and latest novel, THE DEVIL'S COMPANY, he brings back his most popular character --- Benjamin Weaver --- who stars for the third time in one of his books.

Benjamin Weaver is a colorful and multi-layered character. An ex-boxing champion and now self-proclaimed Ruffian and master of disguise, Weaver has a knack for getting into precarious situations and coming out on top. THE DEVIL'S COMPANY poses, perhaps, the most daunting and confounding situation we have seen him in yet. The year is 1722 and the place is London, England. Upon meeting a wealthy and mysterious gentleman named Jerome Cobb and his cohort, Mr. Hammond, Weaver learns that he is being set up and blackmailed into an assignment, with the financial security and well-being of his uncle and various friends at stake.

Initially, Cobb must break into the heavily guarded headquarters of the ruthless British East India Company and steal documents that are kept there. Of course Weaver is successful in this venture --- but he knows that this act alone will not be the last nefarious deed he is asked to do for Cobb, who now wants Weaver to set himself up as an employee of the Company and infiltrate them from the inside to obtain information and trade secrets. Somehow, Cobb is able to pull enough strings to ensure that Weaver is hired and put in the appropriate capacity of trust whereby he will be able to uncover what he seeks.

Weaver goes through with this dangerous assignment because he is guaranteed that, once the mission is completed, his family and friends will be released from the obligations to which they are held by Cobb. He quickly learns that the British East India Company is no ordinary workplace, and they do not simply deal in the innocent trade of cloth and tea. The Company is caught in a secret plot of its own against corporate rivals, foreign spies and government operatives. With every association Weaver makes, he uncovers another truth --- or what he believes to be so. Thus begins the spiral that his physical ability alone will not allow him to overcome.

Who are the mysterious Cobb and Hammond? Are there actually French spies infiltrating the British East India Company in an effort to bring them down? Are Weaver's friends and close associates really in debt to Mr. Cobb, or are there other hidden agendas at work far beyond Weaver's comprehension? Liss handles all of these puzzles and then some as readers will be drawn deeper and deeper into the deadly labyrinth in which Weaver finds himself.

Similar to some of the more engaging work of earlier British authors, such as Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins, Liss has created a shadowy and perilous London where no one is to be trusted and unexpected allies may turn up in the oddest places. THE DEVIL'S COMPANY is written in an entrancing style that will have readers in a constant state of suspense as the novel keeps the surprises coming with a taut depiction of corporate espionage and the birth of the modern corporation.

--- Reviewed by Ray Palen

I have enjoyed all of the novels by Mr. Liss and historical fiction has always appealed to me. Unfortunately, although the book is a decent read I did not think this effort equaled his earlier works, A Conspiracy of Paper and A Spectacle of Corruption. If you have yet to read these earlier works I would suggest you start with them. In my opinion this book went beyond what his previous books accomplished wonderfully, which was telling an entertaining tale while remaining historically accurate. The Devils Company however, seemed to me to go a step beyond in order to make some one-sided point about the evils and dangers of corporations and those who work for them. I thought this took some of the pleasure out of reading what otherwise was a finely penned novel. The book did spark an interest in learning more about the British East India company and its fascinating history.

Benjamin Weaver, Jew, thieftaker, and former pugilist, enjoys a certain notoriety and standing in 1722 London. As a Jew he is used to derision and discrimination and has only in recent years come to bask in a sense of family and community. As a champion boxer he is a bit of a celebrity; feared and admired - a natural for the freewheeling, dubious profession of thieftaker, the 18th century private eye.

His reputation and previous successes earn him hefty fees and allow him his pick of jobs. He has therefore turned down a risky and unrewarding commission to burgle the heavily guarded headquarters of the East India Company.

Unwilling to take "no" for an answer, his would-be clients have resorted to force, paralyzing the finances of his elderly uncle and two of his friends, holding ruin over their heads should Weaver not cooperate. And now, not only do they demand the ridiculous burglary, they order him to investigate a murder without mentioning the victim's name or asking any questions.

Cornered and furious, Weaver naturally attempts to learn what his clients are up to, only to find his every move observed, his conversations overheard, and his friends deeper in peril. Forced to risk the life and liberty of others as well as his own, Weaver is driven to even greater feats of ingenuity and daring.

What Liss (and Weaver) previously did for the South Sea Bubble of 1720 (A Conspiracy of Paper) and the political struggle between the Georgians and the Jacobites (A Spectacle of Corruption), he does now for the burgeoning, scheming, powerful East India Company, not yet an empire builder but with ambitions in that direction.

And, as always, Weaver takes us on a two-fisted tour of London's alleys, taverns, whore houses and thieves' dens as well as the feathered nests of the wealthy and the backrooms of the movers and shakers. Workingmen are a day's pay from poverty and women a man's heartbeat from the streets. The atmosphere is often fetid, the food and drink foul, but Liss' London is vibrant with life.

There's a woman, too, her smarts and skills a match for Weaver's, and fans will hope to see more of her. Liss' latest is on a par with the best of his work, the Edgar winning A Spectacle of Corruption.

To fans of novelist David Liss and anyone who loves thrillers set in dramatic historic times, The Devil's Company is a wonderful encore. Benjamin Weaver, the Jewish pugilist-turned-detective, returns to action against a new and mighty adversary - England's most powerful organization, the East India Company. In the tradition of Liss's Conspiracy of Paper (winner of Edgar) and Spectacle of Corruption, Weaver becomes entangled with dangerous people whose agenda and wickedness are reminiscent of modern-time global business titans. Friendship, love, betrayal, and outright violence keep the story moving--both in velocity and emotionally. Especially in these days of economic upheaval and recklessn corporate greed, it is fascinating to watch Weaver expose the gritty underpinnings of Victorian-age global trade and its loathsome-yet-delicious characters. The Devil's Company is a great read!

Avraham Azrieli, Author of The Jerusalem Inception