THE WHISPERERS by John Connolly

Charlie Parker is one of my favorite characters. Mysterious and melancholy, he is surrounded by violence, yet not violent himself. Otherworldly, and haunted by his past, he can be funny and irreverent.  His friends are both lethal and loyal.

For those unfamiliar with Charlie, his back story is this: an ex NYC cop, now a private detective living in Maine. His wife and little girl were killed some years ago in a horrible way while he was out getting drunk. He tracked down, and killed the murderer, and discovered a gift for kidding the world of a particular breed of serial killer. Along the way he has acquired the friendship of Angel, a scruffy ex-thief, and Louis, an elegant and deadly hit man, who are partners in crime and in life. The exchanges between Louis and Angel are often hilarious, and occasionally, heartbreakingly sweet. They are unswervingly loyal to Charlie, and their intercession often saves Charlie’s life. Louis’ marksmanship and flair for drama reminds me of Harlan Coben’s Win Lockwood, in the Myron Bolitar series. More recently, Charlie has fallen in love again with Rachel, and had another daughter named Sam. Rachel can’t take the violence that surrounds Charlie and has taken Sam and moved to Vermont, leaving Charlie bereft and alone.

This may seem like typical detective drama so far, but Connolly has added another layer to Charlie’s story. When I say Charlie is haunted by his past, I mean literally haunted. His murdered wife and daughter appear to him and others. And Charlie, through his investigations comes to understand that he is a little different than other people. We don’t quite know how yet, but the figures he battles aren’t quite human, and he is followed around by characters that aren’t quite human either. One, The Collector, so named because he takes a souvenir from those he rids the world of, sees himself as “ridding the world of evil”, yet one feels as if he will one day be a threat to Charlie, even though they have an uneasy peace for now.

In The Whisperers, Charlie is again battling unseen foes. A group of soldiers have brought antiquities home from Iraq that they are selling to help each other with medical expenses. One of the antiquities is a Pandora-like box that contains a power causing them to commit suicide. The Collector makes an appearance, as well as the rather gruesome Herod. Particularly interesting was the insight into the soldier’s hardships once they returned from Iraq. Tired of empty promises, abandoned by the government they served, they are forced to band together to survive in a country that has forgotten them. Particularly good was the therapist’s conversation with Charlie about his own Post-Traumatic Stress and the affect it has had on his own life. A unique blend of crime fiction and the supernatural, Connolly creates an eerie world and a tormented hero who battles inner and outer demons.

Publisher: Atria; 1 edition (July 13, 2010)
ISBN-10: 143916519X
ISBN-13: 978-1439165195

Captivity By Deborah Noyes

Captivity is one of those books that you find maybe once, or if you are lucky, twice a year. A haunting story, exquisite writing, compelling characters, and a really interesting plot question. In this case, did the Fox sisters have a gift, or was it a hoax?

The story centers around a true incident in western New York in 1848: two sisters, Maggie and Kate Fox claimed that the dead were trying to communicate with them through poltergeist activity and “rapping”. A dig in their basement turns up the body of a peddler who had died years before, as predicted by the girls. A move to Rochester, to their older sister Leah’s home (and management) soon turns them into a sensation, and creates the birth of the American Spiritualist movement. Despite a number of grueling and humiliating tests, the sisters are never revealed as frauds.

The middle sister, Maggie, is bold, fresh, and extremely likable. She strikes up a friendship of sorts with a local recluse, Clara Gill, and through their friendship the story unfolds. The sister’s story is told going forward, Clara’s is told in flashbacks.

Clara was living in London some twenty-odd years ago, illustrating a naturalist catalog with sketches of animals when she fell deeply in love with the “beast keeper” of the London Tower’s Menagerie. Will Cross is absolutely charming, and irresistible for a carefully brought up young Victorian lady: unsuitable, of course, full of poetry, life, and laughter. He is self-educated, and as exotic as the animals he loves. Their love story is as tender and awkward as every first love and every bit as moving. Anyone who has ever loved and lost can understand Clara’s withdrawal from the world when in ends terribly.

Captivity is very much the theme here. The animals of the menagerie are captives, of course. Will is a “beast keeper” and she a naturalist. She asks him “does it pain you? To see them here?” “Here with me” he says cheerily, “They might be here anyway. They might be here without me”……”They’re going to be shut up anyway” he explains. the world runs it’s course.” But it is her uncle and his naturalist friends who serve the exotic animals at a dinner designed to raise money to study and collect them. They gobble up the very thing they claim to prize. A point that is not missed by Clara. The freedom of birds too, echoes throughout the book: Maggie’s love gives her a canary in a golden cage when he asks her to give up her “rapping” to marry him. She frees it, and he sends it back, saying that he had caught it again. An interesting touch of metaphor in that this bird is a bit of a fraud. Clara sketches birds repeatedly. Maggie gives Clara a nest with a girls hair ribbon in it. Will’s mentor is a gypsy seller of “nesties”.

Clara is a captive of her love, and her past. She has barely left her room in 22 years despite her father’s quiet appeals to do so. She only starts going out when Maggie enters her life and she becomes curious again. Maggie is a captive of her “gift”, her mercenary family, and her need to better herself. And of her own love when he comes along.

Woven throughout the story is the question of the Fox sisters “gifts”. Do they really communicate with spirits? Is it a hoax? Noyes slyly teases and provokes without giving too much away. Maggie loves to drop hints, and Katie seems to actually be a mystic, while Leah is openly mercenary. And if they are fraudulent, are they giving hope or doing harm? And how to they make the rapping/poltergeist activity happen? These are questions the reader must answer for him/herself. It’s a fascinating puzzle.

I highly recommend Captivity. I knew any book about the Fox sisters would be interesting. To this day the controversy continues as to whether they were fact or fraud. I did not expect the tender love story at the heart of the book. Clara is such a wonderful combination of fragile and strong that you just can’t help caring deeply for her. Deborah Noyes has the ability to make all of this very real with a delicate, ethereal beauty. She perfectly captures mood, description and the poetry of love. A marvelous writer. A marvelous book.

To Buy This Book

Publisher: Unbridled Books; 1 edition (June 1, 2010)

ISBN-13: 978-1936071630

Daughters of the Witching Hill and The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane

Daughters of the Witching Hill by Mary Sharratt and The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe.

Purely by coincidence, (or….was it? insert maniacal laugher here ) I read these two fascinating studies of witchcraft and politics back to back. Although set nearly a century apart, and in different continents, they make terrific companion pieces. Both are works of fiction, set against real events, and ask the question “What if the witches, hanged at Salem and elsewhere, and long presumed innocent victims of hysteria and superstition; what if at least some of them really were witches?”

Daughters of the Witching Hill by Mary Sharratt, is the story of a true incident in Lancashire, England during the 16th century. A family of “cunning women”, or Blessers, is accused of witchcraft in order to further the ambitions of a nobleman. The protagonist of the story is Elizabeth Demdyke, who lives during a time when doctors/barbers bled the humours out of starving patients, midwives put knives under beds to cut the pain of child birth, and life expectancy of a nobleman was about 42 years old. A noblewoman was lucky to make 30 after 10 or so pregnancies.

And Elizabeth and her family were no noblemen. Keeping starvation and homelessness at bay were the task of the entire family, and they did what they had to to survive. Bess discovered early on that she had a gift for blessing animals well, potions, and healing. Aided in this by her spirit friend, Tibb, she keeps strictly to light magicks, and wholesome arts. Until the day she is begged by her dearest and oldest friend, Anne, to help her protect her daughter from the son of the local landlord. With no protection, no rights, and no justice, the women do what they must. But the taste of power goes to Anne’s head, and she and Bess part ways over Anne’s dark path.

Bess’s granddaughter Alizon, is the narrator for the latter half of the book. All her life she has run from her families gift, and she lives in terror that Anne’s malice, or her brother’s lunacy will expose the family to ruin. In a time when practicing Catholicism is a capitol crime, her family’s adherence to the old religion is enough to see them hung, never mind the whispers that hang about the two families like a miasma. When Alizon loses her temper and shouts at a local peddler, resulting in a stroke, the innocent suffer with the guilty when the local landowner steps in to curry favor with the devoutly Protestant King James.

Mary Sharratt brings these characters to life in their flawed, sympathetic, bawdy, rich, colorful detail. I particularly like the names of the familiar spirits of the witches: Tibb, Fancy, Ball. The vivid glimpse of a maypole dance in rural England; the dark, heavy glare from the pulpit of the Reformed Faith, eager for the scent of the old religion’s idolatry and incense. The powerlessness of starvation; when parents feed their children mud so they can sleep with a belly that feels full. Who is guilty in such a world? And who is truly innocent?

Beautifully written, a story of tragedy and misused power, I highly recommend Daughters of the Witching Hill.

Oh, and as an amusing aside…while recovering from a migraine the other night, and channel surfing, I heard the name “Elizabeth Demdyke” coming from the television. I found the station again only to discover that the British Spook Show “Most Haunted” is claiming to be followed around by the “Pendle Witches”, featuring Elizabeth Demdyke. On this episode, she had apparently followed them to Wales. Odd coincidence, that.  The old girl really gets around.

Daughters of the Witching Hill
Mary Sharratt
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN-13: 978-0-547-06967-8

The Physick Book Of Deliverance Dane by
Katherine Howe

Connie Goodman is a graduate student at Harvard working on her thesis in American Colonial History. As she searches for the subject of her thesis, she come across the name Deliverance Dane, and gradually comes to realize that Deliverance is one of the Salem Witches, thus far undocumented in history. As the mystery unravels, Connie finds herself drawn into the past in a very real way through visions. Fascinated, Connie goes on to discover that Deliverance is a distant relation to her. And that Connie herself may have inherited some of the gifts that Deliverance, Connie’s grandmother, and mother share. As Connie’s powers grow, so does her ability to sense those who do not have her best interests at heart. Eventually Connie’s search leads her to the search for the grimoire, or the “Physick Book”, the book of recipes, Deliverance handed down to her family as the key to understand the mystery.

A very sweet and tender love story also develops with the story of Deliverance Dane. A local steeplejack named Sam helps Connie solve the mystery and face down the danger that the search for the Physick Book brings. Connie’s mother, an endless source of irritation for Connie, also becomes a source of inspiration as the pieces fall in place.

An interesting note about the author, Katherine Howe, is that she herself is the descendant of two of the accused Salem Witches: Elizabeth Proctor, who survived the panic, and Elizabeth Howe, who was condemned.. She is a gifted writer who brings the past alive in a way that makes it just as real as the present. The two existed side by side in a natural, although mystical, way. Howe has the historian’s fine eye for detail, and brings the 17th century world of woman alive with wry humor; her characters are bold, fresh, and just plain likeable.

The Physick Book Of Deliverance Dane is Katherine Howe’s debut novel, and I’m already looking forward to the next one. I predict a brilliant literary career ahead.

The Physick Book Of Deliverance Dane

Katherine Howe

Hyperion Books

IBSN: 978-1-4013-4133-6