The Dark Lantern

This is one of the best books I've read all year! I honestly had a hard time putting it down it was so riveting. If you're looking for a great mystery, look no further, this is it! I REALLY hope she writes another which takes place during this time frame or earlier, that would be awesome.

Set in the final years of the reign of Queen Victoria, the Dark Lantern is a novel about 3 women with dark secrets. The youngest, Jane, must support herself as a house maid, always fearful of possible exposure of her identity as the daughter of a murderess. She lands a job in the London household of Robert Bentley, whose wife Mina has a hidden past that haunts her and requires constant subterfuge. Downstairs, the servants live in the atmosphere of a viper's nest, with constant spying and backbiting. Upstairs, the family is awaiting the imminent death of their matriarch. The sudden death of the elder brother upsets the equilibrium, and after the woman who claims to be his widow arrives, things will never return to what passed for normal. This well crafted, atmospheric plot plays out against a rich background of class differences, the fog and facelessness of London, the developing science of criminology, and always, a sense of fate and foreboding. Excellent first novel.

Gerri Brightwell's "The Dark Lantern" opens in London in 1893. Sixteen-year-old Jane Wilbred, an orphan whose mother was hanged after being convicted of murder, has forged a letter in order to obtain a position as second housemaid for the Bentley family. She left her job working for a heartless and domineering mistress and traveled five hours by train, hoping that her new situation will be a step up for her. Little does this naïve creature realize that she is a fly about to be caught in a spider's intricate web. Jane will soon settle into an arduous and backbreaking routine. She will be exhausted from her daily grind of hard labor followed by a few hours of rest in a freezing room. She will have almost no time to herself and her hands will become red and raw from incessant scrubbing and cleaning. The mistress of the Bentley household is an elderly woman who is lying on her deathbed. Her son, Robert, and his wife of four years, Mina, have left Paris to take care of matters during his mother's illness. Robert and Mina are almost penniless. They have been living on money that Mina inherited, but their funds are almost gone. Although he does not earn any income, Robert spends his time promoting anthropometry (the science of identifying criminals using body measurements), which he learned from the esteemed Monsieur Bertillon in France. Robert would like the English government to adopt this system, which he claims is superior to dactylography (fingerprinting) as a means of identification, but he has not yet convinced British officials that his method is both efficient and accurate. "The Dark Lantern" is a multilayered story in which Brightwell exposes the lies, deceptions, hypocrisy, inequitable class system, and restrictive gender roles in nineteenth century British society. Almost everyone has something to hide; servants spy on their masters and vice versa. Those harboring secrets live in fear that they will be found out and they desperately resort to bribery and subterfuge to avoid exposure. In turn, those who are in a position to expose the guilty recognize an opportunity to engage in blackmail. With pitch-perfect dialogue and excellent descriptive writing, the author delves into each character's inner thoughts, weaknesses, and vulnerabilities, laying their psyches bare. She is particularly successful in her indictment of the enslavement of the "lower classes" by the ladies and gentlemen who underpaid and overworked them. In addition, she makes clear that in the nineteenth century, women with few resources at their disposal were often forced by circumstances into compromising positions. The characters are beautifully delineated: The reader will identify with the unfortunate Jane, who quickly finds herself a lamb among wolves; Mina Bentley frantically tries to hide her shady past from her husband and fears that her vengeful enemies may be on her trail; Sarah is a cunning servant who quickly gains power over Jane and shamelessl

Jane Wilbred takes a new position as the second maid in a London household to escape the injustice of her service in the country for a family who knows of her past. But Jane may have made a poor choice in accepting a position at the Bentley household because it is full of unkind, even manipulative people who also have secrets. The matriarch of the Bentley family is dying. Second son Robert, who is an enthusiast of the study of anthropometry (the science of identifying criminals by the measurements of certain parts of their bodies), and his wife Mina, have returned home from Paris. Also there is the first son's widow-he had married without informing the family-and then died in a shipwreck on his way home from India. There's a butler who likes his drink more than his job; a cook; Mrs. Bentley's ladies maid; a first maid who searches through her employer's things or stands outside of doors to overhear what is going on; a simple scullery maid; and Jane. Everyone has secrets and is less than stellar representatives of the human race. Put them all together and you have an intriguing look at life in a Victorian England household filled with deception and mystery. Jane is doing more than her share of the work, blackmailed by the first maid who figured out who Jane is, and pressured by the mistress of the house to spy on her fellow servants-or lose her position without a character reference. How can Jane survive in London where she knows no one and her position is becoming intolerable? I was captivated from the first page of the story and held prisoner all the way to the end, trying to guess what would happen next, who was a good guy and who was a bad guy, and who would survive the obvious coming downfall of the household of a Victorian England family that is teaming with secrets and deception. It is fascinating to watch the plots and plans unravel around the people there. And through it all, poor hardworking, mistreated Jane is just trying to survive. Armchair Interview says: Although it sounds like a miserable story, it is not. It is a wonderful set of interconnected mysteries that will leave you glad that you didn't have to serve as a servant in Victorian England!

In 1893 London, housemaid Jane Wilbred obtains a position with the Bentley family by forging a glowing letter of reference and concealing that she is the daughter of an infamous murderer. Jane's new home at thirty-two Cursitor Road is filled with plenty of shenanigans and intrigue since the matriarch is dying; however the newcomer plans to be a mouse hiding as much as possible underneath the stairs and even from her peers. There is a harsh rivalry upstairs between the two sisters-in-laws. The older brother Henry's wife claims her spouse died in a drowning incident while en route to England after years in Bombay; no one knows this widow, a total stranger. The younger brother Robert's wife Mina Bentley plans to be the matriarch and objects to the outsider or returning to Paris where she and Robert lived for several years. Robert ignores the war between the sisters-in-law as his interest lies with gaining official police recognition of the science of body metrics, anthropometry. He tests his theory when the house is robbed by an intruder claiming to be him, but soon spins into something deadlier. This is an excellent Victorian mystery as Jane steals the show with her astute observations honed by being a maid although she is very young. The story line is fast-paced once the robbery occurs and Robert begins his inquiry. Fans of historical mysteries will enjoy THE DARK LANTERN as this is a very bright well written thriller starring a strong cast especially Jane. Harriet Klausner