Lethal Pursuit
Score: 3.5/5 Bookmarks
Thank you to Minotaur Books for sending me a review copy of Lethal Pursuit by Will Thomas.
I feel like I should start by explaining my three and a half star rating. I definitely enjoyed this story, but it did take me almost half the book to really get into and I found some of the language a little too dense with words that have fallen out of use — while I understand that they were probably all the rage in the 1800s, I found that context was often lacking, and so the language forced me out of the story and I had to stop and decipher what they were actually talking about. Between Jarveys, Mensurites, Fopdoddles, darbies, épée, and people being peached on I found it difficult to lose myself in the story. It also took me quite a long time to begin an appreciation for the characters, and having finished the book I’m still not sure if I actually like them very much. I may have gotten there sooner had I read other Barker and Llewelyn books, but this was my first.
In truth I may not have finished the book if I hadn’t committed to doing so, and reviewing it here. However, I am glad that I persevered because things certainly picked up in the second half of the book, containing more intrigue and enough hints to keep me flying through the pages.
I would have liked the mentions of the Knights Templar to contain more in-depth descriptions and context — it felt like the author may be taking the general population’s knowledge of them for granted. I’d researched the organization after my interest was piqued ten years ago, but when I polled friends and coworkers recently none of them knew anything about the Templars. They’re such an interesting group, so I couldn’t help but feel that particular story-line could have been more robust.
In summary, if you like historically-set detective novels then this is worth picking up, just know that the second half is better than the first (in my opinion at least). If you’ve read other books in the Barker & Llewelyn series let me know in the comments, which has been your favorite so far?
Synopsis:
London, 1892—Cyrus Barker is brought into a game of international espionage by the Prime Minister himself in the newest mystery in Will Thomas's beloved series.
Private enquiry agents Cyrus Barker and Thomas Llewelyn receive in the mail an unexplained key stamped with the letter Q. Barker, recognizing it for what it is, uses the key to unlock an anonymous door in the alleyway, which opens to an underground tunnel leading to Downing Street.
The Prime Minister has a small task for Cyrus Barker. A Foreign Office agent stole a satchel in Eastern Europe, but was then himself murdered at Charing Cross. The satchel contains a document desperately wanted by the German government, but while the agent was killed, the satchel remains in English hands. With a cold war brewing between England and Germany, it's in England's interest to return the document contained in the satchel to its original owners and keep it out of German hands.
The document is an unnamed first century gospel; the original owner is the Vatican. And the German government isn't the only group trying to get possession of it. With secret societies, government assassins, political groups, and shadowy figures of all sorts doing everything they can—attacks, murders, counter-attacks, and even massive street battles—to acquire the satchel and its contents, this small task might be beyond even the prodigious talents of Cyrus Barker.
