The Great Stink (Hardcover)

~ (Author) "Where the channel snaked to the right it was no longer possible to stand upright, despite the abrupt drop in the gradient..." (more)
Key Phrases: little milkwort, iron slot, caramel eyes, Alfred England, Long Arm Tom, William May (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

It takes a world of confidence to name your debut novel The Great Stink, and to set it in a sewer. Not even a modern sewer--charmless though that may be--but the crumbling, cholera-laden, rat-infested, fungus-rich sewers of London in the mid-Victorian period, from which pockets of deadly gas frequently burbled to the surface. Clare Clark's unsavory but completely absorbing first novel is a Dantean tour of this reeking underworld and its denizens: both the scavengers--human and animal--and the reformers, who brave the tunnels in the service of public hygiene and social progress after the 1858 Act of Parliament that called for the rebuilding of the sewer system.

The Great Stink juxtaposes two darknesses, both embodied in the filthy tunnels: the lawless desperation of the very poor, and the despair of madness. One of the junior engineers most useful in mapping the existing sewer is William May, a studious, methodical veteran of the Crimean War who manages to conceal from everyone but his wife the horrors he brought out of battle with him. The tunnels don't frighten William; they provide isolation and silence for the bloody rites that keep the Mr. Hyde in him at bay. It seems only a matter of time before William's self-destruction turns outward. Long Arm Tom, his counterpart among the poor, is a "tosher." He enters the tunnels illegally, scraping the sludge for coins or other booty, and trapping hundreds of rats for fighting against dogs at local taverns (all the rage for sporting gentlemen since dog fights have been outlawed). Kindness is a liability in Tom's world, but two acts of pity--one toward a dog, and one, more grudgingly, toward William--provide the resistance that changes the course of this otherwise relentlessly dire story.

The very weak-stomached may need a cup of mint tea or a bowl of potpourri beside them as they wade through the sewer with Tom and William. Clark has spared readers none of the stink, nor the sharp pleasures of suspense. --­Regina Marler

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Dickens fans should devour British author Clark's debut novel, a gripping and richly atmospheric glimpse into the literal underworld of Victorian England—the labyrinthine London sewer system. When the "great stink" of the title—the product of an oppressive heat wave combined with putrid sewage overflow—threatens to shut down the British capital in 1855, the politicians agree to fund massive repairs. That immense public works project is a natural magnet for the corrupt, and engineer William May, a psychologically scarred Crimean War veteran, soon finds his ethics challenged. When he courageously decides not to rubber-stamp the use of inferior brick, he puts his life, his sanity and his family at risk. May's vague recollection of a murder he may have witnessed in the depths of the sewer system results in his becoming the prime suspect and being incarcerated in an asylum. That the mystery's eventual resolution depends a bit too much on a deus ex machina in no way detracts from Clark's considerable achievement in bringing her chosen slice of Victoriana to life. She shows every evidence of being a gifted and sensitive writer in the same league as such historical novelists as Charles Palliser.
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Product Details

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: Harcourt; First edition. edition (October 3, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0151011613
• ISBN-13: 978-0151011612
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.3 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #720,341 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "London, the largest metropolis in the world, was poisoning itself.", September 30, 2005

By	Luan Gaines "luansos" (Dana Point, CA USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

William Henry May, mapmaker and surveyor, joins England's battle against the Russians in the Crimean War, but is wounded and consigned to a filthy hospital ship, where he languishes almost unto death. Given to unaccountable rages and despair, May never imagines he will survive to be recalled to London. He has frozen into uncaring acceptance of his predicament, but recovers the will to live, the raw emotion so painful that he begins to cut himself, the self-mutilation a relief for his overburdened mental state.

When May is hired in the rebuilding project of the London sewers, a huge and expensive undertaking, his prospects have changed radically for the better. Married, with one son and a baby on the way, William is a changed man, but still tormented by nightmares, unhinged by his experiences in the war. William, nicknamed "The Sultan of the Sewers", continues to disintegrate in this dark hell, where his psyche finds peace only in cutting, his wife purposefully oblivious to her husband's suffering. This is the landscape of 1880's London, with little opportunity for advancement, men desperate to carve out a niche that will keep their families from starvation.

As gruesome and as poverty riddled as any Dickensian tale, this novel exposes the indigenous city poverty, personified by the denizens of the sewers, those who make a scant living collecting the mud-encrusted detritus of others. Vast numbers of poor people create income from the even the filthiest refuse, bought and sold for profit. The great rotting underground sewers are a metaphor for the class distinctions that leave the destitute to wallow in the most extreme conditions, soothed by cheap gin, while the Fancy, the rich, indulge in betting to alleviate their boredom, visiting the slums for sport. Even the bureaucracy is corrupt, the sewer project approved, while the funds are withheld by a bickering Parliament.

As the project progresses, the sewers become less navigable, the flushers left to ever more ingenious ways in and out. Under the threat of exposure, agents supplying bricks attempt to force May to accept substandard materials, especially Alfred England, whose bricks have been contracted by May's superior. The stress of constant threats to his family should he not agree to the illegal contracts drive May deeper into the chaos of his own mind, thoughts of death and war merging with everyday reality. Indeed, in the face of murder, who better to blame than the insane, self-mutilating William May?

With remarkable detail that requires a strong constitution, the author reveals the complex underpinnings of city management and graft. In a complex blend of murder, greed and madness, the London bureaucracy ripe for plundering by privateers, the protagonist becomes the unwitting victim of greedy villains. In this unhealthy mix, all are caught in the rude stew of city waste, men with their own personal demons and small enjoyments. Not an easy book to read, with its unflinching detail, The Great Stink is a timely reminder of the skeleton that must be maintained, a framework for civilization, where opportunity offers freedom from a life of discontent and distorted appetites. Luan Gaines/2005

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Clark gives Dickens a run for his money!, March 31, 2006

By	Dave Schwinghammer "Dave Schwinghammer" (Little Falls, Minnesota USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

There's no doubt Clare Clark modeled THE GREAT STINK after Dickens. Readers will be surprised at how well she succeeded.

Clark's acknowledgments tell us quite a bit about how she planned her novel and where she got the title. One of her sources was THE GREAT STINK OF LONDON by Stephen Halliday about the great engineer Joseph Bazalgette's attempt to completely overhaul the sewers of London. Another, Marilee Strong's study of self-injury, A BRIGHT RED SCREAM, provided motivation for one of the novel's main characters, William May. A primary source, LONDON LABOUR AND THE LONDON POOR, gave credibility to her other main character, Long Arm Tom.

The story starts when a Russian soldier bayonets William May during the Crimean War. Robert Rawlinson, who was in charge of sanitary reforms during the war, took an interest in May and helped get him a job as a surveyor working on the Bazalgette's sewer project. The problem was that May was suffering from what sounds like battle fatigue or clinical depression. He began to cut himself to drive away the dark moods, and he used the sewers to do it. Despite his affliction, William May is a highly principled young man, and when a senior engineer solicits a bribe from one of the brick makers, May refuses to go along. The senior engineer sets out to ruin him.

Clark shifts back and forth between May's dilemma and that of Long Arm Tom whose vocation will definitely remind you of Dickens. Long Arm Tom is a rat catcher. He sells them for a penny a piece to gin joints where "Fancies" bet on how many rats a ratter (a dog) can kill in two minutes. Tom adopts one of these ratters when her owner dies. She's one of the best ratters in the history of the sport. The fact that Tom makes a living in the sewer provides a tie to William May. Another Dickens character is the lawyer who takes William May's case when he is arrested for murder. Watch what she does with this guy's hands; she learned from the master.

The scatological descriptions and the emphasis on cutting will bother some, but if you can get past this, this is a really entertaining read. You're never quite sure if William May will make it. Long Arm Tom and his dog Lady add a certain amount of warmth to a sometimes brutal novel.

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars DARK DARK book....that will remind you of Dickens., November 10, 2005

By	sb-lynn (Santa Barbara, California United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

I am giving this book 5 stars, because I found the story and the history of the London sewers so fascinating. I appreciate wonderful fiction that educates me as well as entertains.

Summary, no spoilers:

The is the story of William May, a soldier from the Crimean War.

May has been psychologically damaged from that war, and the horrible treatment he received at the hospital afterwards.

He is married to a very sweet, optimistic woman, but it's is hard for her to keep her mental and emotional balance with someone as severely disturbed and depressed as William.

William, back from the war, is now a surveyor who is assigned the task of helping to redo the decrepit sewer system under the streets of London.

The story features the sights (and SMELLS!) of this amazing underground world, and the book features assorted sundry characters and a murder to boot.

I guarantee you will learn a lot reading this book. And if you are like me, you will find the first 4/5 so depressing, that you may want to consider a Prozac drip.

Saying that, when I was done with the book I was glad I had read it.

I applaud the effort and research that went into this book.

It is not a fast read, but a worthwhile one.