Interesting series to pursue. Lively characters and a challenging storyline. ( )

Originally posted on Just Geeking by.

Content warnings:
This book contains scenes of blood, gore, violence, death, body horror and dismemberment.

It is always a delight to read a new Newbury & Hobbes Investigation and The London Particular by George Mann was no exception. I’m going to start by saying that if you’re familiar with the series this story goes exactly how you expect it to but let’s be honest; that is one of the reasons why we read the adventures of Maurice and Veronica! We know that wherever they go they will get themselves into a mischief and will uncover some sort of dastardly deed!

Set before the final book of the series, The Albion Initiative, it is an uncertain time for our heroes. Along with their long-time companion Sir Charles Bainbridge the pair attend a party at the home of the enigmatic Greyson Fairfax. Everything seems in order, save for one glaringly obvious issue; where is Greyson Fairfax?

When a search for the man turns up a dead body, suspicions rise even further, but before anyone can decide to leave the premises a dense fog (a ‘London Particular’) forces them to stay indoors. Their situation takes a serious turn for the worse when everyone realises that the fog is filled with a strange monstrous mechanical creatures, especially after they witness it murder two party goers who refuse to listen to warnings not to go outside.

While Veronica draws the short straw, and has to stay behind with the guests, she holds her own as some of them get unruly and decide they don’t want to listen to a woman. The scenes of Newbury and Charles hunting through the house were pure thriller, but watching Veronica at work was wonderful. It was great to see Mann’s writing and character creation skills at work with the various different personalities in these scenes as well. I was quite sad that these characters were just appearing for a one-off, especially with the series coming to an end, so it was unlikely that they would appear again (I can’t remember if The Albion Initiative was released before or after this novella).

Things wrapped up as I expected, but as I mentioned, the fun was in getting there. Mann packed a lot of character development into this novella, with each of the characters looking back over their adventures and preparing themselves for what was to come now that Queen Victoria has pushed them into a corner. As another reviewer rightly pointed out; Mann packs a massive punch in 92 pages. It felt no different from reading a full length Newbury & Hobbes novel in terms of pacing and enjoyment. This is a definite must-read for Newbury & Hobbes fans, and you won’t be disappointed.

If you have never read a Newbury & Hobbes investigation, I highly recommend picking up book one, The Affinity Bridge, especially before reading this novella as this book will give you huge spoilers for the series, and you will probably feel a little bit confused about some things.

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Good overall stry and characters. Loved the steampunk era storyline and feel.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this as an Early Reviewer.

A short story that reads like an episode of Doctor Who. While not very complex, it was still quite engaging. I found myself wanting to know what happened next at every page.
My one big drawback is that I was unaware that is was a series, so I went into the story ignorant of the main characters, and the story does nothing to alleviate this. I will more than likely remember the plot far longer than anything about the protagonists. ( )

In truth this book was a little outside my regular reading genres. It is short at 100 pages and the action is across four chapters. A minor point, it might have been helpful within the chapters to have had some horizontal lines at the scene changes to avoid the "where are we now" questions. The main characters are quite complex and due to the book's brevity perhaps lack some detail that a longer novel would have afforded. As I read I was left with many questions. Be warned though, a gruesome story and possibly a few too many murders for such a short book. Overall though, I would recommend it for a quiet evening in or a long train journey, preferably by steam train.

I received a copy of this book from LibraryThing Early Reviewers. ( )