Death in the Devil's Acre by Anne Perry

 The Book

Trigger Warning: Graphic Violence Ahead

    This is the 8th book in Anne Perry's Charlotte and Thomas Pitt novels. This circles back to being a puzzle mystery. 

Pitt is called in to investigate the death of a seemingly respectable doctor brutally stabbed and castrated in Devil's Acre, one of the most disreputable parts of 1887. When the police surgeon called to the scene remarks the case is similar to one he had been to just a few days ago, Pitt does the diligent thing and follows up at a neighboring police station. Their body had yet to be identified. Pitt doesn't expect to know the victim, he's just there for the injuries. Surprisingly in this violent time, both the injuries and the man are familiar. When Pitt can identify the first dead man as Max Burton, the former footman for the Ballantyne family, Pitt is taken back to Callendar Square. When he tells Charlotte, she and Emily cannot resist the urge to meddle. Pitt is frightened for Charlotte's safety, Emily is appalled at Charlotte's lack of social restraint, and Charlotte is caught in a web of lies, where she cannot admit she is married to her husband. The Pitts' marriage will survive, this is Victorian England after all, but will Pitt love her the same afterwards? 

My Thoughts

    This book brings us back to several of the remarkable characters from Callander Square, which I said was Perry's best novel to date. I have to believe I am not the only one. Callander Square was Perry's second book, and while the others laid out the plot and expanded on Pitt's role and world better, bringing his character to the fore, they began to be more adventure novels, and less puzzle mysteries. Times change, and Perry kept up with it. I notice this book is longer than several of the others at 267 pages. Several of the previous books were less than 250 pages, and this one is a bit longer. It feel to me, this plot is a little more straight forward than Bluegate Fields or Rutland Row, but the scenes are more exquisitely drawn out, and the interplay of the characters is a bit more on point. 

    We see conflict in the Pitts' marriage and we see them resolve it. Charlotte's realization of why Pitt would be so frightened for her, allows her to temper her responses, while Pitt learns to accept Charlotte's nature. We are beginning to see the seven year itch in this marriage, the Pitts after all have been together about six at this point. It is enough time to move pleasing each other down the list of things that are important in a marriage, and the struggle between loving who someone actually is and who you wish them to be is real. We see Perry extend her moral arguments, from little asides, to scene by scene consequences inside of the story. It is one of the reasons her works have sold so well. 

How Much My Library Card Saved Me

    This book entered my library on April 06, 2018. It's one of the Ballantine books Trade Paperbacks my library has. This book has not been widely read. While it has sat on the shelf too long for it to have the "new book smell", was extremely hard to hold open. So if I am not the first to have read this copy, I must be among the first.  

Rutland Place

    It clocked in at a price of $17.00. I would like to note that a few weeks ago I read  Rutland Place which was at the time $5.99. When I put in the inflation calculator between when that book was published in paperback and today, we only came up with the price of $13.94. I smell profit squeeze here, and the consolidation of publishers, to the detriment of reader and libraries as ever bigger companies try to squeeze us for every penny we have.

    At 267 pages, it is the longest book by Perry to date. One thing I have noticed is over the years, the length of these books, not just Perry's, but many others in the same genre have gotten longer. While it was once acceptable to have a 217 page book (Agatha Christie circa 1920s), it has gradually become rare for a book to have less than 300 pages, and almost never do I see one that has less than 300 pages any more. That actually makes sense, at approximately 250 words per page a 300 page book is 75,000 words long, or the minimum length I have been advised to present to agents and publishers while seeking a book contract. I do wonder, if the increased length of these books is part of the reason we have seen a decline in adult reading over the years. Food for future thought. 

This book                  $17.00

This summer            $257.01