The Truth of All Things: A Novel (edition 2012)

The Truth of All Things
By Kieran Shields
Broadway Paperbacks (Random House), 404 pgs
978-0-307-72029-0
Submitted by Random House
Rating: Sublime

Wow, what a brew! Puritans, witches, detectives, murder, black magic. It's been a good while since I read something I couldn't put down. I stayed up way past my bedtime to finish this one. The Truth of All Things is Kieran Shields's first novel and, thank the gods, not his last. A review for the follow-up, A Study In Revenge, will be posted in a few days. Both novels are literary historical thrillers starring Portland police deputy marshal Archie Lean and private detective Perceval Grey, formerly of the Boston Pinkerton Detective Agency.

It is 1892 in Portland, Maine, the bicentennial of the Salem witchcraft trials. Maggie Keene, a young prostitute, has been found murdered in an outbuilding of an industrial concern, a pitchfork pinning her neck to the ground, among other gruesome details. Deputy Lean is on the scene with the city coroner and the mayor. The coroner has called on a stranger, a detective from Boston to examine the scene. Perceval Grey is half Abenaki Indian and unorthodox, to put it mildly, a student of Dr. Hans Gross's new theories of criminology and the research of Kraft-Ebing. No one's very confident about this arrangement, but are confounded by the details of the scene, and so decide to see where it goes.

We follow Lean and Grey and a small supporting cast, including a pimp and his hired muscle as well as the Historical Society and a colonel in the Temperance Union, all over New England for the next couple months as more people die in highly original ways. Lean and Grey begin to close in on the perp, who literally believes that the Reverend Burroughs and Satan himself are his homies. We are even treated to the nineteenth century equivalent of chase and action scenes. I can see the film playing in my head, can't seem to dislodge Robert Downey, Jr.

Kieran Shields knows his New England history and geography, lore and legend. He has conjured an intricate tale from a wide variety of elements, from Puritans and witches to temperance activists and rum-runners, class conflicts and immigrant bigotry to tradition and the relentless onslaught of progress. The juxtaposition of the superstitious Puritans and modern criminal investigation and psychology is extreme. In the figure of Detective Grey, Mr. Shields introduces the birth of modern criminology, the theories and techniques that have led us, a hundred years later, to an endless supply of CSIs. Deputy Lean is a surprisingly open-minded officer, willing to follow Grey's lead and learn to accept the scientific method and become an equal partner in the investigation. The author is clearly inspired by the Sherlock-Watson dynamic. Grey and Lean share a relationship that moves from wariness and skepticism to mutual appreciation and respect for each other's complimentary talents. Also, Archie Lean is prone to striking a pose and reciting Longfellow, which has endeared him to my heart.

Here's some sample dialogue for you:

"I have scars older than him." The doctor turned and reached for the doorknob. "I just think this case might warrant someone with a bit more expertise."
"It's just a dead whore, Virgil."
"And MacBeth is just a play about a Scotsman..."

and this (the coroner's niece has been sneaking around his study):

"After you left for Scituate, I was informed by the staff that Helen had borrowed the book I'd promised her. Only I didn't recall any such promise. Upon a close inspection of my shelves, the only volume missing was Kirkbride's work, Arrangements of Hospitals for the Insane. You can imagine how puzzled I was, being unaware that my niece was currently engaged in the construction of an outdated insane asylum."
"There's no need for sarcasm, Uncle."

one more:

"Do you really not believe in spirits?" Lean asked. "The possibility of communicating with some eternal soul in the afterlife?"
Grey looked at him with one eyebrow pointing up to heaven. "The overwhelming majority of people in the world are unimaginative dullards who, in their three score and ten allotted years, manage to divine no purpose for their being other than to chase money, seize what moments of physical pleasure they can, and to create new, largely unimproved versions of themselves, whom they raise with the same mindless disregard they have applied to their own lives. Tell me, please, what use would such beings have for an afterlife? Whatever would they do with an eternity?"

Some description:

He was a paunchy fellow in a well-worn tweed coat. Thick glasses sat atop his upturned nose. A mustache with arrow-sharp tips stretched out across his pale, flabby face. Helen always had difficulty shaking the image of a highly literate mole that had burrowed up into a closet of ill-fitting clothes, then wandered blindly into the library.

The Truth of All Things is flawlessly plotted and paced to hold the attention of modern readers. It is peopled by richly-drawn characters, even the women are people. This novel is set in an elegantly rendered robber-baron era New England. I feel as if you could drop me off in downtown Portland and I could find my way around, just from reading this book. The city is an individual, comparable to Jonathan Kellerman's Los Angeles or James Lee Burke's New Iberia.

If you liked The Alienist by Caleb Carr, you will love The Truth of All Things. It is smart and witty and never underestimates its reader. Go get this book and read it tonight. I cannot recommend it to you highly enough. And I am the luckiest reader on the planet, for I have the sequel right here beside me. Next! ( )

FUN! ( )

In The Truth of All Things, Kieran Shields attempts to recreate the traditional murder mystery. He uses elements of a psychological thriller, of the supernatural, of historical fiction, and of modern-day true crime stories to present his tale of a murder that is not quite what it appears to be. The witch hunt aspect takes a surprisingly long time to develop, but once it does, the plot quickly tangles into a den of history and psychological illness. The complicated resolution provides enough closure for readers who want a stand-alone mystery while leaving the door open for future adventures of Deputy Marshal Lean, Mr. Grey, and Mrs. Prescott.

The Truth of All Things runs the real danger of falling prey to its own cleverness. The plot twists are many and so intertwined that it becomes difficult for a reader to perceive the individual threads. The last-minute twists and turns are so numerous that they soon feel almost contrived, as if Mr. Shield’s desire to surprise the reader with a crafty ending outweighed the need to provide a clear and concise plot. In addition, the resolution of the mystery is drawn out in such a way that it leads one to believe that Mr. Shields had difficulties deciding how best to solve his own mystery. The result is a mystery that is a touch too complicated and slightly too drawn out for easy, mindless enjoyment, but only just barely.

The main characters of The Truth of All Things are equally complicated and puzzling. Archie is fairly well-described. His motivations are clear, and a reader feels a close connection to his desire to protect the innocent and provide a better life for his family. Helen is on the opposite end of the spectrum and is the least clear of the three heroes. Her past, her relationship with her uncle, as well as her thoughts and motivations are never adequately explained, if at all, and a reader finds it difficult to understand why she involves herself in the mystery at all. Once involved, she is the equivalent of today’s modern technicians – those quirky masters of research who stay in the office uncovering all the dirt there is on the suspects while their fellow detectives hit the pavement and rely on their research to direct their own searches. In view of the details provided of Archie, Helen’s lack of backstory is surprising and slightly unwelcome, as one wants to feel an emotional connection to the characters in order to better appreciate any danger in which they might find themselves. One does not have this connection with the mysterious Helen.

The third hero, Perceval Grey, is a mix between Archie and Helen. Readers get greater insight to Grey’s past, making it easier to feel that necessary connection with him. However, his motivations remain unclear. His thought processes are never explained except via dialogue, and his actions are almost robotic in their exactness. He is one hero in which a reader does not get direct insight into his thoughts and feelings because the omniscient narrator never tells the story from his point of view. If, in the crime mystery canon, Archie is the bumbling but beloved old-school detective, out to achieve the most good he can for those that can no longer help themselves, and Helen is the quirky but highly-skilled research technician, then Grey is the mysterious, brilliant, highly logical, and thoroughly unemotional investigator with the unsavory past that propels him from one mystery to the next. One cannot help but wish that Mr. Shields had chosen not to adopt these archetypes, as the efforts he makes to provide a relatively new type of murder mystery fails to bear fruit with his usage of such clichés.

Mr. Shields’ debut novel is an intriguing blend of modern-day forensics, mysticism, and a good old-fashioned murder mystery. Archie, Helen, and Perceval make for an unusual crime-fighting trio, altogether too modern for the time period but well-suited to the mystery at hand. With its intricate plot twists and reliance on knowledge of the Salem witch trials, the story itself might prove to be too complicated for most readers. More importantly, there are just enough unanswered questions that leave a reader to understand that there will be more collaborations in store for this hapless trio. As a standalone mystery, The Truth of All Things works fairly well, although it toes the line at being a tad too clever for appropriate enjoyment. The success of a potential series is more nebulous without greater character development or less-complicated mysteries. It is easy to chalk up the faults of The Truth of All Things to an over-eager first-time novelist and one can hope that time, experience, and careful attention to feedback will correct these issues in Mr. Shields’ next novels.

Acknowledgments: Thank you to Julie Cepler at Crown Publishing Group for my review copy!

Kieran Shields may try to pack just a bit too much detail into The Truth of All Things, and the narrative may extend just a bit too long, but in general it's very much a worthwhile read. It's also set in Portland, which automatically gains it a few points in my book!

In the summer of 1892, Portland police deputy Archie Lean is faced with a gruesome and mysterious murder, along with an unlikely (and very Holmes-like) comrade-in-investigation, Perceval Grey. They, along with their erstwhile companions, must attempt to unravel the murderer's plot before more people lose their lives. It turns into a tale of dark magic, insanity, and historical memory (there's much dashing into libraries to look at old documents, which of course I approve of heartily).

While the exposition sits a bit heavily on the plot, and the story gets a bit bogged down at several points, I certainly wanted to know what was going to happen and how Shields was going to pull everything together at the end. A good first effort, I think, and I'll certainly be watching for future books from Shields! ( )

In 1692, five men were executed for the practice of witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts. One of those men, a Reverend George Burroughs originally of Portland, Maine, was accused not only of witchcraft, but of having murdered his first two wives. Two hundred years later, a madman seeking revenge (or something even more sinister) has claimed Burroughs has their master and is leading the police on a ghost hunt across New England. Deputy Lean, assisted by Perceval Grey—as Holmsian a tribute as there ever were—and American Civil War veteran Dr. Steig, race against time to find the killer, end his spree, and maybe even avert a crisis of epic religious proportions.

All of this makes for an interesting concept, but the execution is a bit fatiguing. At times it can feel like there are too many characters to keep track of their personal lives, lives that are often not fully explained and are left as loose ends once the mystery is solved. This is clearly a well-researched novel, and I love a good Salem Witch Trials reference, but all of that research and all of that information seems to clog up the process. What author Kieran Shields is trying to allude to is in direct competition with the actual plot, making the whole thing feel rather forced.

As a veritable Holmes, Grey’s methods and idiosyncrasies are well-illustrated and entertaining but his background, shrouded in a sort of mystery from the other characters, is also somewhat clouded over for the reader, making him a bit unlikeable. Even Deputy Lean, whose measured demeanor enlivens his character, is somewhat unlikeable when the author neglects to flesh out his background. As a mystery novel, this practice of keeping the reader guessing is acceptable, but you can't have drama without characters who are driven by something more than the plot at hand, and it's that something more that seems to have been forgotten.

Lauren Cartelli
www.theliterarygothamite.com ( )