Angels in the Gloom (World War One Novel 3) [Paperback]

The haunting descriptions of WW1 era village life, the trenches and the grim war at sea bring home how increasingly alien & poignant that world is to 21st century life, as the last few survivors from that era slip away.The fact that I found the characterisation of the main villain of the book slighlty unconvincing did not detract from the other characters or the whole book.

There's enough vigour in the story to keep one turning the pages, but the book would have been twice as good if it had been half as long. One almost gets the impression that Perry is being paid by the word: she never uses one adjective when two will do, she overdoes almost every effect, and above all she never neglects a chance to harp on the idea that World War I was unpleasant. If this were a new idea, the repetition might be tolerable; but it's virtually impossible to read anything about WWI, fictional or factual, that doesn't stress how unpleasant it was. We are so unaccustomed to seeing it in heroic terms nowadays that we seem to value deserters and conscientious objectors more than the men who did their duty! So there's really no need for Perry to pile on the agony. And it ends by making all her main characters - even the well-meaning Joseph - seem wimpish. If everybody involved in WWI had really been as self-pitying and touchy-feely as these characters, Britain would probably have been defeated in 1916. I think this wimpishness is deeply anachronistic and also psychologically false: many men may be traumatised by war, but others can cope and some positively relish fighting. If we can't convince ourselves of that, our hope of preventing present and future wars is nil, because we are refusing to recognise the varying mentality of those who fight in them.
I found myself comparing Perry's rather flaccid prose with the lean, economical, powerful account of war at sea in C. S. Forester's 'The Ship'. With matchless vividness, Forester shows us the effect of war on a range of human beings who are profoundly individual yet part of a resolute and effective fighting machine. The horror and the pity are there, but so is the glory. Forester for me.

"ANGELS IN THE GLOOM" is book #3 in Anne Perry's ambitious 5 part WWI series. Aside from the first novel, "No Graves As Yet," with its slow-paced narrative, the other 4 books - all containing thrilling murder mysteries, well researched historical fiction, chilling espionage, and an extraordinary cast of characters, are not to be missed! This is truly a special series, and if you want to skip "No Graves As Yet," you can always start with book #2, "Shoulder The Sky," which does a terrific job of recapping the plot.

Set just before and during the Great War, "the war to end all wars," the quintet has one major storyline, which propels the action and keeps one riveted, but it is not resolved until the denouement in the fifth novel, "We Shall Not Sleep." This ongoing plot concerns the "Peacemaker," a mysterious figure who represents those who seek to make a treaty between Kaiser Wilhelm II and King George V, which would unite warring Germany and Britain into a common front. The Peacemaker "is a man who would sell a nation of forty million people into oblivion, betray into bondage their history, their culture, their language, and everything they had created over a thousand years." There are other complex mysteries throughout the series, however, to keep the pages turning, while the Peacemaker storyline is developed further. The author's description of war on the Western Front is so vividly described that the reader feels as if he/she is present in the trenches. The development of all the characters, especially the Reavley family, is brilliant and, after accompanying these people on so many adventures, I have come to care for them deeply. The ongoing espionage, and the perpetrators involved, provide an added attraction which builds tension and drama.

"ANGELS IN THE GLOOM" finds Captain Joseph Reavley, chaplain and former Cambridge professor, ministering to the wounded and dying in the thick of trench warfare on the Western Front, the Ypres Salient in Belgium - a job he has been doing since the war started in 1914. It is now 1916, and Matthew Reavley, Joseph's younger brother, a member of England's Secret Intelligence Service, (SIS), is fighting the war covertly from London, desperately trying to find the identities of the "Peacemaker," and his treacherous minions, before they can implement their lethal schemes. Twenty-six year-old Judith Reavley, Joseph's and Matthew's youngest sister, is a volunteer ambulance driver and amateur nurse when needed. She serves on the frontline battlefields and has been at this bloody task since 1914, risking her life on more than a few occasions. Only Hannah, living with her children in the family home in Cambridgeshire, seems safe, although her husband, Archie MacAllister, is a Commander in the Royal Navy and always in harm's way.

While trying to save another soldier's life, Joseph is severely wounded, in fact, he is so badly injured that he must return home to St. Giles to recover. He joins Hannah and her two children at the large Reavley home where she nurses him back to health. St. Giles, once a bucolic and peaceful place, is filled with grieving families, mourning the losses of brothers, sons and husbands. Shanley Corcoran, an old school friend, comes to visit Joseph. Corcoran heads a team of scientists working at the local research facility. They are in the process of inventing a new torpedo, a missile that would track U-boats with more accuracy - "which could change course, if needed, search out a U-boat through the water and explode when it strikes." If successful, this invention could end the war quickly, and save England, especially if the United States doesn't join the war. But when the lead scientist on the project is killed, the chances of success dim. Now the town is rife with fears of spies and treachery.

A prototype of the device is eventually built and set to be tested on the destroyer "Cormorant," commanded by Hannah's husband. Matthew Reavley has been selected to go along on the voyage to try and draw out and capture a German spy. In a thrilling episode, during the Battle of Jutland, Mathew finally confronts the man he believes to be the Peacemaker... and almost loses his life in the process.

Subplots abound, including one which surrounds a beautiful Irish spy who becomes involved with Matthew. Both are aware of each others' work and accept the inevitability of their doomed romance. I quickly became absorbed in each of the series mysteries, except for book #1. The author manages to grab the reader and pull him/her along into another time and place. "Angels In The Gloom" is a terrific read. Highly recommended!!
Jana Perskie

No Graves as Yet
Shoulder the Sky
At Some Disputed Barricade (World War One Novel 4)
We Shall Not Sleep (World War One Novels)