Category: Fiction
Publisher: William Morrow
ISBN-13: 9780061375385
Pub. Date: February 2008
Date Read: March 2008
“The Theater of Marvels starring Mr. Edward Moon and the Somnambulist. Be astonished! Be thrilled! Be enlightened!”
Once Edward Moon helped the London police force solve the most complex of crimes but now his fame dwindling, he just performs his weekly shows at his theater on Albion Square. The Somnambulist, an 8-foot tall wonder who only communicates by spelling out words with chalk on a slate board, aids Moon, a conjurer by profession, in the show.
For the theatergoers there is the thrill of seeing the Somnambulist receive sword thrusts without pain or blood spilled. For Moon there is just the show to perform until one day he’ll be given the chance to help out with an investigation again. The police have a complex murder scene on their hands and need Moon’s help.
While tracking down the killer, this strange duo will meet a human fly, attend a séance and be part of many other bizarre happenings in this fantastical novel teeming with human oddities.
All the while the omniscient narrator of the story interjects doubts as Moon and the Somnambulist go on the trail of the murderer.More violence occurs and an intricate plot is uncovered, one that can have sinister consequences for the whole of Victorian London.
With an interesting cast of characters and wonderful descriptions of London’s dark underbelly, it seemed like this novel had all the makings of a unique story but frankly as the novel progresses the story only becomes more convoluted. Is this a mystery, time-travel, fantasy? While I don’t need a book to fall neatly in one genre this one just felt like it trying to be all over the place and I couldn’t make sense out of it.