The Devil's Game
An Unlikely Mystery
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4.0 • 1 Rating
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
It is 1834, and the town of Bellminster is thrown into the turmoil of a by-election for Parliament. Reverend Tuckworth tries to stay away from it all, but when a political rally turns deadly, the town turns to Tuckworth in hopes of staunching the blood on the streets. Soon the situation grows more dire when someone in Bellminster sees the chaos as an opportunity for murder. Yet as Tuckworth investigates, what can he accomplish when even his oldest friend questions his motives and wonders which candidate the dean is working for?
With a vibrant Victorian setting and fine attention to detail, The Devil's Game sets David Holland among the front ranks of historical mystery writers.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Holland's impressive third Victorian novel of crime and corruption (after 2003's The Devil's Acre), the tormented Reverend Tuckworth is still haunted by his mercy killing of his fatally ill wife. When the death of Bellminster's member of Parliament causes a feeding frenzy among the town's powers-that-be and would-be power players, Tuckworth's friend and patron, Lord Granby, further stirs the pot by deciding to stand for election. The resulting turmoil divides the community, and some resort to violence to influence the voters. After an innocent bystander is brutally beaten to death, Tuckworth finds himself unable to resist investigating, despite the local leadership's opposition. Though the choice to reveal the killer's identity early on somewhat undercuts Tuckworth's achievements as a sleuth, Holland does an excellent job at evoking the desperate claustrophobia of the town, which will remind many of the setting of Dickens's Hard Times.
