Customer Reviews

To Kingdom Come: A Novel

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Will Thomas continues his winning streak in "To Kingdom Come," a wonderfully entertaining and well-researched mystery featuring Cyrus Barker and his young Welsh assistant, Thomas Llewelyn. Mr. Gladstone is the Prime Minister of England and the Irish are clamoring for Home Rule. A militant faction sets off a series of bombs, and an explosion blows out a piece of Scotland Yard's Criminal Investigation Division. Cyrus Barker, who is a Private Enquiry Agent, volunteers to locate and infiltrate the group responsible for the bombing. Reluctantly, Mr. Robert Anderson of the Home Office agrees to Barker's "mad scheme to hoodwink the Irish."

Cyrus Barker disguises himself as the reclusive Johannes van Rhyn, a German explosives expert. Barker uses his wide range of contacts to find the most militant of the Irish anarchists, known as the Irish Republican Brotherhood, and he feigns sympathy with their cause. As van Rhyn, Barker offers to help the Brotherhood build more effective and deadlier bombs. In the process, both Cyrus and Thomas risk their lives to prevent this desperate group from committing further acts of violence.

Will Thomas beautifully evokes the language, class distinctions, and political infighting of England in the late 1800's. It's all here, from Charles Parnell living the high life with his English mistress to William Butler Yeats writing poetry for Maire O'Casey, the sister of one of the anarchists. There is subtle humor, authentic atmosphere, colorful dialogue, a touch of romance, and an instructive history lesson about terrorism in Victorian England.

Cyrus Barker and Thomas Llewelyn are marvelous characters. Barker has a private chef prepare his gourmet meals, but he is willing to "live rough" when he is on a case. He is a master of disguise, foreign accents, and hand-to-hand combat (including stick fighting) and he has useful underworld connections. Llewelyn screws up his courage and follows the lead of his fearless and adventurous boss. He knows that if the militants discover their true identity, he and Barker are as good as dead. Still, Thomas owes his life to his mentor, and he is willing to carry out Barker's orders, whatever the consequences. I love the "father-son" relationship between the gruff and laconic Cyrus and the callow Llewelyn.

I recommend that you read Will Thomas's first book, "Some Danger Involved" before you pick up this excellent sequel. Fans of Victorian mysteries will thoroughly enjoy this evocative, exciting, and beautifully written novel.

In 1884 London Enquiry Agent Cyrus Baker and his assistant Thomas Llewelyn are practicing martial arts exercises when they hear the explosion. Feeling they may be able to help, the two rush to the devastating scene of the Scotland Yard wing containing the newly formed Criminal Investigation Department Special Irish branch. As they assist the surgeon with field operations, the twosome learn of another bomb exploding at the Junior Carleton Club. The police brass at the Yard assumes both blasts were the work of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, a radical group willing to murder innocent civilians to foster a free Irish state.

Inspector Poole informs Baker and Llewelyn that several other bombs were found before they ignited. Believing that the narrow focus on SIB is going to prove false, Baker quietly spreads the word that he and his associate are explosive experts to see who they can reel in. Not long afterward, the Invisibles want to employ them in a plan to explode London in TO KINGDOM COME.

The latest Baker Victorian mystery is a terrific historical tale that uses the bias between the Scotland Yard leadership and SIB to provide insight to the beginning of the Irish issue that still haunts the Isles. The efforts to uncover and stop the Invisibles are cleverly developed to provide a fabulous thriller, but also shed addition light on the late ninetieth century. Baker is a fine sleuth while his assistant who narrates the tale is his Watson except much more innocent in worldly affairs. There will be no doubting Thomas that this is one of the best historical series on the market today.

Harriet Klausner

An author's second novel is a very important thing. If his first was successful and/or critically acclaimed, the second proves whether the achievement of the first was a fluke. A reader can determine whether the things she liked about the first novel are truly characteristic of the author's style and intent.

I found "To Kingdom Come" a very satisfying book, because it confirmed to me my enthusiasm for "Some Danger Involved" and my hopes for the future of the Cyrus Barker-Thomas Llewelyn series were not misplaced. In "To Kingdom Come," Will Thomas has again taken the reasonably familiar setting of late-1800s London and then overlaid it with the more unfamiliar one of Irish revolutionaries and a sort of Celtic underground in London and Liverpool. Unlike the high-society, upper class murders so many mystery-writers build their London-themed mysteries around, Will Thomas seems to have a fascination with the foreign, the outsiders, and others whose blood is distinctly not blue. All this makes for refreshing stories that are both easy to settle in with (Cyrus Barker's London, after all, is Sherlock Holmes' too, chronologically speaking) and full of color and detail that are new and unfamiliar. Peeking ahead into the just-released third novel "The Limehouse Text," I see we have still more of this to look forward to.

Second novels, too, have the advantage that an author has already established the basic outlines of his characters, their personalities, backstories, and how they behave. "Some Danger Involved," naturally, was heavy on introducing us to Barker and Llewelyn, and the actual murder mystery had to share space with that. This is less necessary in "To Kingdom Come," and so we have more room to focus on the story itself. And a good story it is, too, with a surprising contemporary element: terrorist bombs exploding simultaneously in several London locations. Of course, the characters aren't stagnant: we learn a little more about Barker's mysterious background, and Thomas Llewelyn continues to develop as an interesting and sympathetic narrator.

I was pleased to be able to leap from Will Thomas' first novel right into his second, and am glad to say "The Limehouse Text" is on the top of my next-to-read pile. This second novel reassured me that my judgment about Thomas' novels, and his promise as a novelist, wasn't in error. That makes for a nice little feeling of personal satisfaction on top of the great deal of satisfaction I got from the novel itself.

Will Thomas puts together a winner in "To Kingdom Come", a mystery/detective novel set in the late 1800's in Victorian England. The narrator of the story, Thomas Llewelyn, is a young Welshman apprenticed to Cyrus Barker, a "private enquiry agent" (a private detective) in London. In broad outline, the story focuses on the efforts of Barker and Llewelyn to stop a group of Irish terrorists from blowing up half of London in order to win independence for their homeland. Barker and Llewelyn, posing as experts in creating "infernal devices", infiltrate the group and the fun starts from there. I'm not going to go into too much more detail, because I don't want to ruin the story.

Instead, I'll tell you why you should buy this book. First, some authors just "get it", and Thomas is one of those people. This is a tightly written story, with very little wasted effort. Thomas doles out details only in measured amounts, which keeps the reader interested and wanting more. For example, Llewelyn knows general facts about his employer Barker, but only learns specific details as the reader does, by seeing Barker in action. Thus, Thomas adroitly has the reader guessing as to what will happen next or, more appropriately, "how in the heck are they going to get out of THIS jam?" Although Llewelyn wants to trust his mentor, he has the uneasy feeling (as do we) that Barker would sacrifice the young man if it meant reaching the objective. This creates great tension in the story.

Second, the background detail provided by Thomas sets a convincing scene and mood. Some authors think that they can create a period piece by simply setting modern-day characters with modern-day sensibilities in a different era. That doesn't work. As Thomas shows, period pieces work by having the characters act, talk and think as characters would at the time. For example, Victorian England was a very class-oriented era. Although we don't know that Barker was a "gentleman born", he acts like a gentleman in the story, even to the point of refusing to eat with someone who Barker finds unsavory. Further, Baker will not tolerate Llewelyn acting in any less a manner. Although not as complete, Thomas's vision on London reminded me of Caleb Carr's 1800's New York in "The Alienist".

Finally, "To Kingdom Come" is just a good read. A great opening scene, lots of action, interesting characters, seductive beauties and literally a bang-up ending. While some might wish to compare Barker and Llewelyn to Sherlock Holmes (and Barker's name would seem to be a tip of the hat to Holmes' 221B Baker Street address), there is more mystery and fallability to Baker than there was to Holmes, Holmes' morphine addiction notwithstanding. Baker is a dangerous man with a mysterious past and even more mysterious present habits, such as the locked rooms in his office and the identity of the woman he disappears to see from time to time. But he is much more expressive in emotion than Holmes, and, thus, more "complete" a character, at least to this point. But by not shotgunning everything out about Barker in this or in his first book with these characters ("Some Danger Involved"), Thomas has left himself wide open for many more adventures with Baker and Llewelyn. Enjoy!

A very interesting book in light of the times in which we live. The story is told by Llywelyn, which gives it a humanity and personal view as he talks about his fears and insecurities. Barker is an enigmatic, but we learn about him as does Llywelyn. I very much enjoy developing relationship between the two characters. The author has clearly done his research of the time and includes a literary figure as a secondary character. The writing is excellent with some of the best first lines, in the prologue and first chapter, I've read in a long time. I would read the series in order but this was a very good read in, what looks to be, a wonderful new historical mystery series.

I'm afraid that I must admit to being slightly disappointed with this book. That may seem like an unusual thing to say for a novel I've rated as a 4 star book, but the fact remains that I'm ultimately disappointed because I didn't get the book I had expected. That is completely my own fault.

My first acquaintance with the writing talent of Will Thomas came from his first Cyrus Barker novel, Some Danger Involved: A Novel. I enjoyed that book tremendously because Thomas is a wonderful writer and his presentation of Victorian England is outstanding. His main characters of Cyrus Barker and Thomas Llewelyn are fully portrayed in all aspects of their personalities. His descriptions of the time in which the story takes place is so detailed that I find it completely realistic and believable. All of those things are present in this novel also. My problem is that this book turned out to be a political thriller, not a mystery story at all according to my own personal definition. I had a hard time becoming interested in the plot by the Irish Republican Brotherhood to intimidate the British government into granting Ireland home rule by bombing London into submission. I learned an awful lot about how to make a bomb from scratch. I learned a lot about how to fight with sticks. None of this was of interest to me. I realize now that I should have paid closer attention to the description of this book because it is actually right there for me to see if I had only noticed. My dereliction came about when I expected this second book to be the same type novel as the first simply because it was written by the same author. That isn't Mr. Thomas' fault and I cannot penalize this well written book because of my carelessness.

I think TO KINGDOM COME owes more to Rex Stout and John LeCarre than Conan Doyle--a very complex novel utilizing historical events to shine a light on our world. Plus, who can resist a young W.B. Yeats?

I've had more fun reading Will Thomas books in the last couple weeks than I have the whole rest of the year. Absolutely terrific. Wonderful writing, intriguing plots, and characters that are so real you'd think they actually existed somewhere, or wish they did. The only problem I have with Will Thomas is his books come out but once a year. Drat!

This is one of an addictive series about a pair of detectives -- sorry, private enquiry agents, in London in the 1880s. Well written, well crafted plots, historically accurate background. What more could anyone want of a mystery?

The first novel in the Barker-Llewelyn series, Some Danger Involved, had a very good atmosphere to it, but the mystery aspects left much to be desired. That novel had the team involved with London's Jewish quarter. To Kingdom Come pits the pair against Irish revolutionaries who are setting off bombs in London, one of which damages Barker's office. Some Danger Involved kept the team in London, and it provided a very entertaining sense of time and place. But the storytelling was not as strong as it should have been, and the mystery aspects were weak and unsatisfying.

To Kingdom Come takes Barker and Llewelyn away from London to Liverpool and nearby areas: they are in disguise as bombmakers and join an Irish bombing group. They are accepted by this group much more readily than would seem reasonable. Barker and Llewelyn blow up a disused coastal lighthouse with spectacular effect. This impresses the Irish group to be sure, but it seems that none of the locals or fishermen, etc, find anything at all suspicious in the disappearance and destruction of a familiar landmark. The greater problem is that there is very little sense of time and place here--the blowing up of the lighthouse could be in the year 2005 rather than 1884 with only minor tweaks to the tale. So without the sense of time and place that powered Some Danger Involved you get what is basically a quite pedestrian story.

As I was reading and enjoying Some Danger Involved, I bought To Kingdom Come and the next two books in the series. But To Kingdom Come was rather a letdown after the first novel, and it may be a while before I continue on to The Limehouse Text. Don't start the series here--start with Some Danger Involved. That novel explains the pairing of Barker and Llewelyn, and it's better written.