Customer Reviews

The Fiend in Human

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

Victorian London comes alive in all its squalor, filth, stink and teeming humanity in this clever, elegantly written thriller about a down-on-his-luck journalist determined to make his name by saving an innocent man from the gallows.

Edmund Whitty covers public hangings and other juicy topics of the day for a popular scandal sheet, which just about keeps him in drink and opium. He's fallen a notch from his Oxford Days, but not so low he can't feel ashamed when his cruel, clever jeering ruins the career of a "patterer," Henry Owler, whose sale of true crime verses barely keeps his daughter and his ward in greasy soup and straw pallets.

Owler seeks the exclusive confession of a serial killer, William Ryan, dubbed Chokee Bill, "the fiend in human form," and extracts a promise from Whitty (by arranging an involuntary visit to a labyrinthine slum) to resurrect his reputation if his verses prove true. Owler has an in at the prison, but there's a problem. Chokee Bill insists on his innocence and the killings have continued - hushed by the police, the merchants, even the pickpockets and Owler himself - all the people who suffered while fear of the fiend kept business away. Only Whitty, ever in need of a sensational story for his readers - has reason to pursue the real killer.

Gray takes us into the lodgings of the privileged and the reeking shacks of the destitute, the variously appointed taverns of journalists, prostitutes, thieves and worse. He takes us to brothels and drawing rooms and the prison cells of condemned men. And he spins a classic yarn full of heroism and hypocrisy, viciousness and desperation, thrills and just desserts and low blows.

The atmosphere is odoriferous and visual, the plot full of characters who belie their appearances, and the writing is witty, sardonic and Dickensian. If you like Caleb Carr, you will love John MacLachlan Gray.

Victorian London is abuzz with news of a serial killer in their midst. That buzz is fed by profit-driven newspaper columnists who each strive for the most sensational story.

Edmund Whitty is one such columnist for The Falcon. He is also a drunken lout with steep gambling debts that he can't seem to pay. One evening he is beaten severely as he leaves his favorite drinking place. He is subsequently spirited to the deepest underbelly of Victorian London society to be confronted by a man whom Whitty has recently defamed in a recent newspaper column.

Whitty's world turns upside down and author John MacLachlan Gray's excellent novel takes off. I don't know that I would, like the book's cover, classify this book as a thriller. This is a suspense novel of the first rate. But it is not a typical thriller where action overrides reason in forwarding it's plot.

Rather, Gray has written a fantastic story of crime, injustice and retribution centered around less-than-regal Victorian London society. His detailed depictions of life in London's underbelly are so effective that the reader can smell the aroma of the unkempt and yet feel the nobility of their humanity. His equally honest portrayal of human foibles and the wrongs of class consciousness are settled in the reader's mind. His plot is unpredictable and surprises abound. Yet there is still a rousing ending that will leave the reader cheering.

This book is a must read and should be on recommended Victorian reading lists everywhere, with only a couple of warnings.

This is a work of historical excellence. As an American, it took me a while to become accustomed to the Victorian slang and other linguistic derivations of the time. But keep going, dear readers. For the language will become clear and that accuracy in language makes the book so much more genuine. There is no modern sensibility at play here. No cheap effort, the langauge helps to make the setting real.

This is also not the light happy fiction that many an American reader has come to expect from best-sellers. This is quality realism. Life in London's underbelly of the time was not pretty. Societal mores called for survival skills that some now will find repugnant. Gray's characters are real. None are perfect but all are very human.

Read this book! It is a historical treasure.

Gray's gifts as a dramatist are in evidence throughout this fine novel. The dialouge and period detail are marvelous. Strange that this ambitiuous entertainment didn't get the reviews lavished on Mr. Timothy which was fine but not as well-written.

With no small amount of national pride, I'm thrilled to report that mere superlatives somehow seem insufficient to convey Gray's debut success with The Fiend in Human.

Edmund Whitty is a profligate, dissolute freelance journalist who has succumbed to every known Victorian vice save womanizing - snuff, cigarettes, gin, opium, laudanum, and Acker's Chlorodine (a potent mixture of opium, marijuana and cocaine in alcohol!) Despite having achieved a measure of journalistic fame and public notoriety by assigning the moniker "Chokee Bill" to William Ryan, currently awaiting execution for the strangulation and grisly mutilation of five ladies of questionable virtue, Whitty struggles with an ongoing desperate need to produce the income required to stave off gambling debtors who won't hesitate to use a physical beating to persuade payment. In the course of searching out new "crisp copy", lurid sensational pieces he can submit to his tight-fisted editor, he meets the impoverished Henry Owler, a "patterer" who wishes to render Ryan's last confession before his hanging into "true crime" verse. But Ryan (not unlike other convicted criminals, of course) protests he is innocent and circumstances begin to persuade Owler and Whitty that Ryan is indeed telling the truth. The signature white scarf killings have continued, swept under the carpet and hushed up by one and all - the police, the merchants, the petty criminals and even the poverty stricken residents of the local neighbourhood! Whitty in a desperate bid to achieve real fame in a fading, limpid journalistic career and financial freedom from the debtors who are relentlessly hounding him, decides to stake all on proving Ryan's innocence.

Gray has masterfully married the ascerbically witty, comic and always flowery Dickensian dialogue with Anne Perry's superb, elegant atmospheric descriptions of Victorian London life and then improved both by taking a step down into a much grittier, earthier representation of real characters living real lives. Two gentlemen Oxford swells pass wastrel days around gaming, sex and booze. The pain and wretched difficulties of daily life in a London slum are portrayed in exquisite, graphic detail that might warrant a warning to sensitive viewers were the medium television instead of a novel. Older female chaperones, quaintly termed "confidential friends", are employed to protect the nominal virtue of young ladies of marriageable age. The surviving local champion bare-knuckles boxer is portrayed as a friendly publican quite capable of acting as his own bouncer. Steet walkers and hookers are picked up by "gentleman" johns with a ritualized stylized dialogue and negotiation that, by today's standards, is absolutely hilarious.

You'll be treated, for example, to Gray's wonderful Dickensian variation on a simple theme that you and I would have written as simply "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder":

"For in truth there exists no young female (charwoman or countess, schoolgirl or flower-seller) in London who does not exist in some male mind as a tantalizing fantasy, in whose honour some schoolboy does not regularly engage in self-abuse - fantasy which, when he becomes an old boy, he will seek to make real. Hence, the relation between the brothel and the theatre: success in both depends upon one's observation of the world, of the human mind, as well as one's own outward identity in the calligraphy of sex."

The whodunit succeeds admirably with a couple of superb twists reserved until the final pages. In fact, the final twist, a brilliant piece of mis-direction by Gray, is held in reserve until the very last paragraph! On a somewhat deeper level, Gray manages, like Dickens, to also make probing critical comment on a number of issues without disrupting the flow of the story in the slightest. For example, his criticism of the ethics of journalists and the vested interest they have in creating news where none necessarily exists is quite apparent.

What a find! The Fiend in Human qualifies as perhaps the finest, most enjoyable read I've had the good luck to encounter over the last few years!

Paul Weiss

With no small amount of national pride, I'm thrilled to report that mere superlatives somehow seem insufficient to convey Gray's debut success with The Fiend in Human.

Edmund Whitty is a profligate, dissolute freelance journalist who has succumbed to every known Victorian vice save womanizing - snuff, cigarettes, gin, opium, laudanum, and Acker's Chlorodine (a potent mixture of opium, marijuana and cocaine in alcohol!) Despite having achieved a measure of journalistic fame and public notoriety by assigning the moniker "Chokee Bill" to William Ryan, currently awaiting execution for the strangulation and grisly mutilation of five ladies of questionable virtue, Whitty struggles with an ongoing desperate need to produce the income required to stave off gambling debtors who won't hesitate to use a physical beating to persuade payment. In the course of searching out new "crisp copy", lurid sensational pieces he can submit to his tight-fisted editor, he meets the impoverished Henry Owler, a "patterer" who wishes to render Ryan's last confession before his hanging into "true crime" verse. But Ryan (not unlike other convicted criminals, of course) protests he is innocent and circumstances begin to persuade Owler and Whitty that Ryan is indeed telling the truth. The signature white scarf killings have continued, swept under the carpet and hushed up by one and all - the police, the merchants, the petty criminals and even the poverty stricken residents of the local neighbourhood! Whitty in a desperate bid to achieve real fame in a fading, limpid journalistic career and financial freedom from the debtors who are relentlessly hounding him, decides to stake all on proving Ryan's innocence.

Gray has masterfully married the ascerbically witty, comic and always flowery Dickensian dialogue with Anne Perry's superb, elegant atmospheric descriptions of Victorian London life and then improved both by taking a step down into a much grittier, earthier representation of real characters living real lives. Two gentlemen Oxford swells pass wastrel days around gaming, sex and booze. The pain and wretched difficulties of daily life in a London slum are portrayed in exquisite, graphic detail that might warrant a warning to sensitive viewers were the medium television instead of a novel. Older female chaperones, quaintly termed "confidential friends", are employed to protect the nominal virtue of young ladies of marriageable age. The surviving local champion bare-knuckles boxer is portrayed as a friendly publican quite capable of acting as his own bouncer. Steet walkers and hookers are picked up by "gentleman" johns with a ritualized stylized dialogue and negotiation that, by today's standards, is absolutely hilarious.

You'll be treated, for example, to Gray's wonderful Dickensian variation on a simple theme that you and I would have written as simply "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder":

"For in truth there exists no young female (charwoman or countess, schoolgirl or flower-seller) in London who does not exist in some male mind as a tantalizing fantasy, in whose honour some schoolboy does not regularly engage in self-abuse - fantasy which, when he becomes an old boy, he will seek to make real. Hence, the relation between the brothel and the theatre: success in both depends upon one's observation of the world, of the human mind, as well as one's own outward identity in the calligraphy of sex."

The whodunit succeeds admirably with a couple of superb twists reserved until the final pages. In fact, the final twist, a brilliant piece of mis-direction by Gray, is held in reserve until the very last paragraph! On a somewhat deeper level, Gray manages, like Dickens, to also make probing critical comment on a number of issues without disrupting the flow of the story in the slightest. For example, his criticism of the ethics of journalists and the vested interest they have in creating news where none necessarily exists is quite apparent.

What a find! The Fiend in Human qualifies as perhaps the finest, most enjoyable read I've had the good luck to encounter over the last few years!

What's that? You wish to book a tour of Victorian London? With apologies to Mr. Wells I am afraid I do not have a time machine. However I have the next best thing, this novel by Gray. John MacLachlan Gray will guide you to the Falcon employer of correspondant Edmund Whitty, a sometimes down on his luck opium eater investigating the murders of "fallen women" on behalf of the Falcon. The prime suspect William Ryan dubbed The fiend in human form, Chokee Bill, by Whitty claims innocence. Gray during the ongoing drama will lead you to rat fights and public houses, guiding you through the gas lit streets of London circa 1852.

The above is an inadequate attempt to provide a glimmer of the atmosphere that permeates this thriller, much like the smoggy streets I almost felt I was walking as I read this incredible tale. Carr's The Alienist was proclaimed by many as an astute historical thriller, upon which many have tried to emulate. Yet the scenery, and dialogue in this story even sets the tension through which the narrative moves in THE FIEND IN HUMAN in a time and place that is almost plausible that Gray actually visited such is his powers of story telling.

The characters are consitent with the setting and I could envision myself looking over the shoulders of Dorcas and Phoebe(two supporting characters) as they pickpocketed the unwary to help support their family in the slums.

Have I praised this book enough yet? Hardly all I can say again is reading this is the closest anyone can come to a virtual tour of Victorian London until technology provides an alternative to the literary skills of Gray.

I was in the mood for a dark, historical mystery so I ordered this book based on the reviews. As it turns out, it was really very funny and clever. I found it to be less of a suspenseful thriller, and more of a take on the sensationalism of newspapers and journalism in the Victorian era. I really enjoyed it, and will look to see if the author has any other plans for Edward Whitty.

I enjoyed this novel very much though I can see why some readers would be put off by the writing. While the writing in my opinion is very good, it's not going to be to the taste of those who choose their fiction primarily from the best sellers lists. Nothing against the best-sellers list, the books found there are best sellers after all, I've found books I've enjoyed there myself. But for the most part you can sit down with a best-seller and get right into the story, the writing doesn't tend challenge the reader, it generally appeals to the masses and most people don't like to have to work too hard at what they read for pleasure.

I did find this book at challenge at first. What kept me reading was the subtle and often not so subtle humor that had me laughing out loud multiple times during the first chapter. Though other readers might not care for the intoxicated, opium-eating under achiever of a protagonist, I thought Edmund Whitty was clever and charming. The narration is in the present tense and while I know it's not Whitty telling the story I found myself attributing the amusing sense of humor the narrator has to the character of Edmund Whitty.

I liked that characters seemed to arrive in pairs, homely, introverted Walter Sewell and handsome, extroverted Reginald Harewood both well to do gentlemen who were classmates of Whitty's at Oxford, the prostitutes, tall and experienced Flo, short and naive Etta, the shoplifters, Dorcas wild and daring, Phoebe controlled and discriminating. Each seems to possess the opposite traits or experience of the other. These characterizations illustrate the fact that you often see what you want to see, the good or the bad in someone depending on what you are looking for and once you've made certain observations, assumptions about the rest of a person's character are further made. This for Whitty turns out to be an important mistake.

It took some effort to settle into this book but I'm happy I did. I'm still laughing at certain passages. Here is one:
"Nothing is more incendiary to an ill-advised, unanticipated tryst than to be enclosed in a darkened, plush-upholstered, moving chamber. Privacy, Intimacy, Darkness, Transience: the Four Whorsemen of the Apocalypse."

I wouldn't recommend this novel for everyone, however I would recommend it for fans of historical fiction who enjoy something more challenging than what's typically found in the mainstream. While part of the mystery wasn't very mysterious to readers who were paying attention the story itself was still very enjoyable.

I'm the author and I give the book 5 stars, so I'm
prejudiced. However, I have never met or heard of
anyone who posted a review here.

What distinguishes The Fiend in Human from the myriad other Victorian thrillers?
1) The protagonist. Edmund Whitty is dissolute, insolvent, and hapless--yet aware of these shortcomings to comic yet poignant effect. He's also articulate, intelligent, intuitive, and despite an exterior of skepticism and degeneracy, a highly moral being. All of which makes him someone you want to spend as much time with as possible.
2) The writing. By combining the arch floridness of Victorian prose with a present-tense, subtly ironic style, Gray has created a distinctive voice.
3) The supporting characters. Not a cliche or stock character among them.
4) The humour. Yes, the story revolves around a Jack the Ripper type, but the book is damn funny nonetheless.