Score: 4.5/5 Bookmarks

I absolutely loved Things in Jars by Jess Kidd! I went into it not really knowing what it was about, so I was delighted when all of the delicious weirdness of Bridie Devine’s world unfolded before me.

Bridie is a female detective in Victorian London, who‘s been asked to locate the kidnapped Christabel Berwick. But Christabel is no ordinary child, and you’d best watch those razor-sharp teeth of hers, and does she have a tail? You’ll have to read the book to find out!

This delightful tale was more moving than I would have expected, given the storyline, but I bonded with the characters so quickly that I really felt for them.

I think this book would make a spectacular movie, it’s so atmospheric and the characters practically jumped off the pages. Plus I’m dying for it to become part of a series, I want more Bridie Divine (and more Cora, the seven-foot housemaid too)!

The audiobook is narrated by Jacqueline Milne, who does a superb job of it. Grab the audiobook by clicking the button below, or get a physical copy here.

Synopsis:

Bridie Devine, female detective extraordinaire, is confronted with the most baffling puzzle yet: the kidnapping of Christabel Berwick, secret daughter of Sir Edmund Athelstan Berwick, and a peculiar child whose reputed supernatural powers have captured the unwanted attention of collectors trading curiosities in this age of discovery.

Winding her way through the labyrinthine, sooty streets of Victorian London, Bridie won’t rest until she finds the young girl, even if it means unearthing a past that she’d rather keep buried. Luckily, her search is aided by an enchanting cast of characters, including a seven-foot tall housemaid; a melancholic, tattoo-covered ghost; and an avuncular apothecary. But secrets abound in this foggy underworld where spectacle is king and nothing is quite what it seems.

Blending darkness and light, history and folklore, Things in Jars is a spellbinding Gothic mystery that collapses the boundary between fact and fairy tale to stunning effect and explores what it means to be human in inhumane times.