Well, you can’t say you weren’t warned.
With black-edged paper and a gruesomely green front, Jon Mayhew’s debut novel is even at first glance not ideal for those of a sensitive disposition. It starts with an impressively eerie prologue – I am so pleased to see the prologue being resurrected as a literary form, I might add – and not only because my work-in-progress has got one. I felt the quotations from various folk songs added to the macabre air and there was clear sense of a well-worked story arc in each chapter.
The revolting ghuls are a disgusting delight and I think Mr Mayhew has had some fun with naming his characters as well. The circus-in-the-marsh is a particularly haunting aspect of the story and I much enjoyed Alfie and Josie’s bickering. What has happened to Gimlet?
I am looking forward to the next: The Demon Collector, I believe – but I will have to fight my beloved for it!