Peter Ransley

It's 1625 and Charles I has been crowned king. Near Oxford, plague cart driver Matthew Neave has been tasked to remove a dead baby and throw it into the plague pit, but as far as he knows, there is no plague at the farm where he's been sent; what's more, after a short while on the back of the cart the baby shows signs of life. Sixteen years later, and Matthew and his adopted son Tom are working in the London docks in Poplar, when Tom catches the eye of Lord Stonehouse. Shortly after, Matthew disappears, and Tom is being apprenticed to Mr Black, a printer in the city with Parliamentarian sympathies. While Tom is getting more involved with the Roundhead cause, he also investigates the matter of his parentage, and the possible connection to the Stonehouse estate.

Described as a thriller by the author, this book failed utterly to raise any sort of tension about Tom’s parentage, as I really didn’t care which of the three Stonehouse gentlemen turned out to be Tom’s biological father or which of the three was trying to kill him; the mystery surrounding his mother was eventually given away by the author himself in what to me felt like an aside. Where the novel succeeds unequivocally, however, is the period setting, which invokes the posturing between Parliament and the king, the breakdown of negotiations and the eventual call to arms with wonderful day-to-day details of the lives of Londoners and those living on a countryside estate, as well as the routines of militiamen; the scenes set in London that deal with the Grand Remonstrance make it abundantly clear that something unprecedented was taking place, and the Battle of Edgehill shows the savagery of war – never mind a civil war – without flinching away from the savagery of battle, while its aftermath shows only too well the psychological impact on a young man who just had to take someone’s life for the first time.

I thought the author also succeeded to show how quickly a civilised society can disintegrate, with members of each party, Roundheads and Cavaliers, committing acts of unspeakable violence against members of the other party because they believe theirs is the righteous cause. The story is usually told in the first person by Tom, but for some inexplicable reason the author switches to an omniscient narrator just before the Battle of Edgehill, only to switch promptly back again when the hostilities are underway, which to me really jarred the flow of the story; along with some, albeit minor, inconsistencies, this novel falls just short of the required four-star mark to be allowed to be kept on my book shelf (with its limited space). A shame, because I always thought the period leading up to and the length and aftermath of the English Civil War a fascinating time in history, but I don’t think I will follow Tom on his further adventures as to me the book can very well stand on its own, with various plot threads sufficiently tied up; for those interested, an extract of the second volume in the trilogy, Cromwell’s Blessing, is added in the end notes.… (lisätietoja)

Started reasonably well as a murder mystery with the first half of the book setting the scene and the building up of the characters, mainly a schoolgirl Ann Devenish and the policeman Gates. The storyline was based around 3 murders in a small community and a series of robberies, which took place over a number of years. Ann was an immature rowdy girl at first who saw the first body as Gates was at the scene She had a difficult relationship at home and had a sort of anti hero effect over friends and boyfriend. The story then jumped 2 years and Ann was transformed into the school's most talented pupil. She got involved with a teacher, Miles, whose wife was murdered. The sory became over-complicated with Ann having a split personality and she became more and more confused as events unfolded as to what her involvement was. As a reader this confusion was transferred to myself and so unsatisfactory were the last 50 or so pages I almost gave up caring about the conclusion of the story.… (lisätietoja)

Vi befinner oss på midten av 1800-tallet i England. Den aristokratiske jenta Maud Lilly vokser opp på det som den gangen ble kalt dårehuset fordi hennes mor i sin tid havnet der. Da hun er 12 år blir hun hentet av sin onkel, som ønsker å oppdra henne som sin sekretær. Det viser seg etter hvert at onkelens arbeid er temmelig aparte … Dessuten er onkelen en hustyrann, som holder Maud innesperret. Ikke har hun venner og hun har heller ingen mulighet for å treffe menn på sin egen alder. Og han forventer at hun leser høyt fra de helt spesielle bøkene hans og det selskap han til enhver tid omgir seg med.

Susan Trinder er foreldreløs og vokser opp blant småkjeltringer i en fattig del av London. Hun og de andre hun lever sammen med blir oppsøkt av en som kaller seg Gentleman. Han vil at hun skal være med på et plott som skal gi store økonomiske gevinster. Han kjenner nemlig til at Maud vil få utbetalt en betydelig sum i morsarv den dagen hun fyller 21 år – forutsatt at hun gifter seg. Gentlemans plan er å forføre Maud og få henne til å ville gifte seg med ham. Dersom Susan utgir seg for å være kammerpike og tar jobb hos Maud, vil hun få sin del av kaka. Når Gentleman og Maud er vel gift, skal de få henne innlagt på galehuset og så få kloa i arven hennes.

Etter hvert er det ikke godt å si hvem som lurer hvem, og ting utvikler seg absolutt ikke som planlagt. Dessuten har ingen tatt høyde for at det skulle oppstå lidenskapelige følelser mellom Maud og Susan …

Filmen er basert på Sarah Waters roman med samme navn. En del av rolletolkningene ble til tider vel melodramatiske og overtydelige, og dette trakk helhetsinntrykket av filmen noe ned. Filmen er riktignok en miniserie, men dramaturgien kunne med fordel ha vært strammet noe inn idet 3 timer ble i drøyeste laget. Ellers var selve plottet både spennende og overraskende! Kanskje hadde jeg blitt noe mer fascinert dersom filmen hadde vært basert på en roman skrevet på 1800-tallet, og ikke i 2002.… (lisätietoja)