Lawless and the House of Electricity Blog Tour Guest post from William Sutton.

I am delighted to be involved in the blog tour for the latest instalment in the Campbell Lawless series of crime thrillers set in mid Victorian London, perfect reading for the Madwoman in the Attic. Thanks so much to William for the guest post he has provided here about Victorian advertising and to Lydia Gittins at Titan for sending me a copy of the book.


Lawless & the House of Electricity by William Sutton, third in his series of Lawless mysteries exploring the darker sides of Victorian London, is published by Titan Books, and features a mad woman in the attic, whose symptoms are all too Victorian.

ASTHMA CIGARETTES: ADVERTISEMENTS AND INSPIRING ILLNESSES
Victorian advertisements beguile me. They speak volumes of the age, of its anxieties and its swindlers. Dr Batty’s Asthma Cigarettes For the temporary relief of paroxysms Not recommended for children under 6

You couldn’t make this stuff up. Well, you could, but the real examples are better. (View more on Pinterest.)
With all our vitamins, homeopathics and aromatherapies, you might think this is the age of dodgy medications, but you wouldn’t believe the things Victorians tried. In writing Lawless & the House of Electricity, I returned over and again to advertisements and other picture inspirations for two strands of the book: terrorism and illness.




VICTORIAN DIAGNOSES
A wonderful range of ailments is purportedly cured by Dr Williams’ Pink Pills for Pale People: “paralysis, locomotor ataxia, anaemia, weakness, scrofula, sundry ailments”. From this I derived diagnoses, more and less reasonable, for Lady Elodie, the mysterious absentee at Roxbury House.

Arsenical Soap was used to treat “disfigurements: blotches, blemishes, freckles, pimples and pustulance”. The fact that it was poisonous caused problems, and suspicious deaths accelerated through the mid-century. The Arsenic Act of 1851 did not stop the panic over poisonings, as seen in ITV’s drama Dark Angel.

I recommend you read further in Kathryn Harkup’s A is for Arsenic, which gives encyclopaedic detail on the myriad ways you may poison your loved ones (or your characters).



DIABOLICAL DIAGNOSES I got so inspired by all this, I wrote a ditty about it for the Writing Edward King project (hear it on Soundcloud), characterising the wild range of diseases that sent people to those daunting and magnificent asylums that sprung up around the country after the Asylums Act.

I’ll admit that scrofula and pustulance aren’t too common today (at least in Europe, though Dickensian concerns are often still operative in the wider world). But researching hysteria in Asti Hustvedt’s excellent Medical Muses: Hysteria in Nineteenth-Century Paris made me think twice before mocking Victorian medicine.
We may laugh at “strolling congestion, drawing room anguish, dissipation of nerves and imaginary female trouble” (genuine contributory factors cited upon commitment to a Victorian asylum). But if we mock Victorian diagnoses, what will today’s diagnoses look like in future?

Jon Ronson’s The Psychopath Test explodes the alarmingly arbitrary origins of today’s diagnostic criteria (psychologists using DSM, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders). Perhaps we should think how today’s diagnoses will be laughed at in the future.
I resisted classifying Lady’s Elodie’s disease by modern criteria (depression, epileptic absences, fugues). It has more in common with the encephalitis lethargica of Oliver Sacks’ Awakenings and the catalepsy-lethargy-somnambulism of Charcot’s hysterics in the Saltpêtrière Hospital of Paris.
The pictures remind us that the past was once the present: laugh if you dare, but you will be laughed at in turn one day.


TOP VICTORIAN PIC SOURCES
Follow these stars of Twitter and the blogosphere and the world of Victorian pics will open up: 1. My pictorial inspirations on Pinterest 2. British Library’s Open Source archive 3. Whores of Yore (Kate Lister @WhoresofYore). See especially her Word of the Day and Historical Hotties 4. Victorian London (Lee Jackson @VictorianLondon) 5. Wayward Women (Lucy Williams @19thC_Offender

Electric Blog Tour Day 1 (Tags: writing, Vic Pics, diagnoses, ads, inspiration, asylum, madness) 

Blog Tour Warning

Just a note to say that on Monday I will be kicking off the Blog Tour for Lawless and The House of Electricity. This is the third instalment of the Lawless series by William Sutton. If you aren't already aware they are a superb series of crime novels featuring Sergeant Campbell Lawless; a Scottish born policeman based in the Victorian East End. All the stops on the blog tour are listed above. Check out more about the books and the author here.  https://www.william-sutton.co.uk/

Madwoman in the Attic #6 Frances Power Cobbe

Frances Power Cobbe was born on December 4th 1822 at her family's estate at  Newbridge House in North Dublin. Her family were strongly evangelical in their faith but Frances began to question conventional religious belief and after her mother's death in 1847 she stopped attending church services. In 1855 she published Essay on Intuitive Morals setting out her own belief on religion and ethics. This caused a rift with her father and she left home permanently soon after. Frances travelled extensively in the years that followed and published Italics (1864) about her travels in Italy. She became involved with the Ragged Schools movement in Bristol and her time working with poor, sick and unemployed women fueled her interest in women's rights. She wrote a number of pamphlets and essays on women's education and women's suffrage, campaigning for assault to be grounds for separation. She was a leading member of the National Society for Women's Suffrage. In the 1870s she focused mostly on her campaigns against vivisection and was a founding member of both the National Anti-Vivisection Society and the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection.
A regular contributor to a number of magazines and periodicals she also wrote an autobiography published in 1894. Frances lived with her lifelong partner the sculptor Mary Lloyd from 1860 until Lloyd's death in 1896. They are buried together at Llanlltyd in Wales were they lived most of their lives.

Murder By Ghostlight

Murder by Ghostlight is the latest installment in J. C. Briggs Charles Dickens & Superintendent Jones Investigate series. Having brought a production of Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s Money to Manchester, Charles Dickens discovers a dead body on the stage of the empty theatre and is immediately suspected of murder. With the aid of his friend Superintendent Jones of Bow Street and the local police the pair set out to prove Dickens’ innocence and unravel a web of intrigue surrounding the dead man. This is a fast paced and page turning tale and the author clearly pays homage to Dickens both in the style of writing; Dickensian descriptions of poverty, industry and gloomy weather abound, but also in the colourfully named characters such as razor nosed Eva Stabb and solicitors Tape and Binding. The portrait of Dickens himself is a balanced one, while he enjoys fatherhood he is a neglectful husband and though aware of his own flaws in many instances, he has a tendency to pomposity and the dramatic. This is a cleverly written Victorian mystery which will have broad appeal, while the author doesn’t stint on the gore the narrative is witty and intriguing. Highly recommended for fans of Dickens obviously, but also for anyone who enjoys Oscar de Muriel’s Frey and McGray series of Victorian mysteries, The Sherlock Holmes novels or the novels of Diana Bretherick.

Published by The Mystery Press 2016

This review originally appeared in Historical Novels Review Issue 80 May 2017 and can be viewed here 

https://historicalnovelsociety.org/reviews/murder-by-ghostlight/

Arrowood by Mick Finlay

Arrowood is the debut novel from Mick Finlay. It's set in South London in 1895 and it features a consulting detective, but this is not Sherlock Holmes. The tagline for this story is "London Society takes their problems to Sherlock Holmes everyone else goes to Arrowood." Arrowood is fat, balding, often drunk. He's a terrible brother an even worse employer and friend and he hates Sherlock Holmes with a burning passion. The police generally aren't interested in his help so he has to use unconventional or even illegal methods to find information but somehow he and his partner Barnett seem to get the job done. When a young French woman seeks their help in locating her missing brother Barnett and Arrowood soon find themselves embroiled in a mystery that includes a dangerous criminal gang, Irish American revolutionaries and corruption at the highest levels of power. The writing is furious and fast paced Finlay knows his way around Victorian London and like Arrowood he knows people; from the drunks at the bar to the kind hearted women like Arrowood's sister who nurse the sick and the destitute, to the servants quarters and flop houses this is a Victorian London that's richly peopled and beautifully drawn. If you a fan of Sarah Pinborough's Mayhem or if love the camaraderie of Frey and McGray in Oscar de Muriel's books then Arrowood is for you. If you are fan of Sherlock Holmes you will probably love it all the more. All the familiar Sherlockian tropes are there but they are subtle and carefully used and the whole story is also shaded with political ideas and a darker and grittier tone than Conan Doyle ever used. This is a fantastic start to what I hope will be a longer series.
Thanks very much to the team at LoveReading and to the publishers HQ (Harper Collins) for the chance to read and review this novel before release.
Arrowood will be out on 23rd March 2017 in hardcover

The Moonstone's Curse by Sam Siciliano

The Moonstone's Curse is the latest title in Titan Books Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes series. I am always happy to read anything set in the Sherlock universe and this book was a fine addition to that world neatly blending plot and characters from Wilkie Collins The Moonstone with Sherlock's London society. Well to do aristocrat Charles Bromley seeks the help of Holmes and his cousin Dr Henry Vernier because he believes his wife is in imminent danger. His wife Alice has inherited the priceless diamond known as the Moonstone from her father Neville who inherited it from his mother Rachel Verinder the original recipient of the diamond in Wilkie Collins novel of 1868. Bromley goes on to explain the diamond's bloody history and the belief that Alice's ancestor had stolen the diamond during the siege of Srirangaptana and murdered the man tasked with guarding it. Alice is convinced that because of this bloody history the Moonstone is cursed. She believes that it killed her parents and she wants to get rid of it. However Alice is prevented from selling the diamond by a clause in her inheritance which means the diamond must pass intact to her surviving kin. Alice has recently begun to see faces at the window and is convinced that someone has come from India to take the diamond back. Sherlock Holmes is of course intrigued and the game is indeed afoot. Following on the trail of a murdered jeweller Holmes and Vernier are soon entangled in the mystery of The Moonstone and under its sinister spell. Tying Sherlock Holmes to what most would consider the first detective or mystery novel is a smart move on the part of the author and one that Siciliano has pulled off before; his previous Sherlock Holmes novels include The White Worm inspired by one of Bram Stoker's less successful outings. The Moonstone's Curse is however a twisty mystery full of intriguing characters especially Vernier and his wife Michelle Doudet-Vernier  also a doctor. The contrast between the frightened and laudanum addicted Alice and the redoubtable Michelle offers a marked commentary on Victorian feminity.
I really enjoyed this novel and look forward to reading more of the adventures of Holmes and the Verniers.

The Moonstone's Curse is published today 14th February and is available in paperback and ebook from Titan Books. Thanks so much to Phillipa Ward for sending me a copy.

Associates of Sherlock Holmes edited by George Mann

This collection edited by George Mann is the third he has produced for Titan Books and features a number of writers well known for their Sherlockiana such as Lyndsay Faye and James Lovegrove as well as those such as Simon Bucher-Jones who is presenting his first Sherlock Holmes story here. Unlike many other stories set in the universe of Arthur Conan Doyle which present the cases from Watson's viewpoint as Doyle did, here we see Holmes and Watson through the eyes of others; including Inspector Lestrade, Irene Adler and many more. It allows many of the associates, clients and villains to tell their own stories for the first time. The collection opens with a new story from fan favourite Lyndsay Faye as she allows Police Inspector Stanley Hopkins who appeared in Doyle's "The Adventure of Black Peter" to tell us a brand new tale of body parts dredged from the Thames in "River of Silence" There are some brilliant supernatural touches too courtesy of Jeffrey Thomas and Tim Pratt.
Titan are undoubtedly the best and most enthusiastic publisher of Sherlockiana and this collection is a fantastic idea although some stories are less successful than others. This collection is also a wonderful showcase of the work of some great new (to me) authors of crime, science fiction and fantasy. I will certainly be exploring more of the work of some of the authors I have encountered here. Fans of Sherlock Holmes won't be disappointed and in fact I went back to the original stories with new insight.
Perfect for fans and new readers alike.
Thanks to Philippa Ward from Titan Books for a review copy of this book.
Associates of Sherlock Holmes is published later this week.