Book Review: The Last Days of Newgate

Reviewed By: Catherine Thompson - RAM

The Last Days of Newgate     Amazon US HC Amazon UK PB Amazon UK HC Amazon Canada HC
Andrew Pepper
Class/Genre:   Mystery   Thriller   Historical
Series: Pyke Mysteries
Weidenfeld & Nicolson, $24.95 trade paperback, 312 pages

London, 1829: In the notorious slums of St. Giles, Pyke, a Bow Street Runner, stumbles upon a triple murder whilst doing some detective work on the side for Lord Edmonton. Pyke’s used to scenes of brutality and mayhem, often causing them himself, but this time one of the victims is an hours-old infant. The child’s death and its makeshift resting place of a urine-filled pail unsettle Pyke more deeply than he wishes to acknowledge even to himself.

Embroiled in this investigation, Pyke soon realizes that he may be little more than a pawn in a game of politics, as Protestants riot in the streets against the Catholic Emancipation Bill and his own Bow Street force seems destined to succumb to Peel’s Metropolitan Police Bill. Not long after he begins ruffling feathers amongst the rich and powerful, Pyke finds himself falsely accused of murder and on the wrong side of the bars at Newgate Prison. With some help from Lord Edmonton’s daughter, he escapes to pursue those who have put him in prison and punish them in his own way.

The Last Days of Newgate is not for the faint-hearted. It is a novel of brutality, of murder committed without a second thought. The central character, Pyke, is utterly amoral, willing to do whatever it takes, and then some, to get what he wants.

That said, The Last Days of Newgate is an outstanding debut. Pepper has done his research and certainly has not sanitized the history. He depicts the slums of pre-Victorian London in all their grim detail, and his descriptions of sectarian violence in Belfast at the time seem spot-on.

Catherine Thompson - RAM

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Catherine Thompson - RAM