Death of a Radical (Fr Jarrett Mysteries) [Paperback]

First Sentence: Ancient walls rose up against an indigo sky.

It's 1812 and the beginning of the industrial revolution but not everyone is embracing technology. Luddites and radicals fear these advances will be the end of independent craftspeople. In the town of Woolbridge, the Easter fair threatens to erupt in violence. One of the local judges brings in the military as a precaution. Jarrett, agent to the Duke of Penrith, must look to his young, visiting cousin, balance the attentions of two lovely ladies, and find out who murdered a man found laid out neatly in his bed.

We have been waiting a long time for this second book in Ms. Jenkins' series and I am so glad it is finally here. I was immediately reminded of the reasons why I enjoyed the first book "The Duke's Agent."

I value an author's ability to create a sense of place through written pictures..."This was land pared down to its primitive bones. ...an enchanted land that might flick them off into oblivion with a shiver of its crust." Now there's an image that can't help but stay with you. Jenkins brings the place, people, and story to dimensional life for the reader. This is enhanced by the excellent dialogue. Te speech is reflective of the period but not labored. The exchanges between the cousins, Raif and Charles, have the natural banter of those who are close. The young cousin, Favian, whom the older cousins refer to as "Grub," is convincing in idolization of his older cousins while stretching his newly-found independence.

There are quite a lot of characters in the story, some of whom were more fully developed than others and I occasionally had trouble remembering who was who. I often do wish more publishers would allow for a cast of characters. What I did particularly appreciate was that through a tragic story and bits of conversation, we learn much more of Raif's background and history. Raif and Charles are characters in whom I've become invested and about whom I definitely want to know more.

One element I found interesting was that, to me, the book has a feel of being very much a "man's" book, similar to the Patrick O'Brian books. This is not, at all, a criticism. The principal characters are all very much male, even with the female characters adding a romantic/sexual element. The series has a definite swashbuckler feel to it, even though it's on land. It may be due to the period in which it's set or the strength of the male characters, but I very much liked it.

The story has a very good plot with good twists, diversions and side threads. There is an excellent buildup of tension and a terrible release from it. The end was at points both poignant and highly satisfying with the door being left open for more to come. I do sincerely hope so although I also hope it's not another 13 years before we see Jarrett again. Please get writing, Ms. Jenkins, your readers are waiting.

DEATH OF A RADICAL (Hist Mys-Frederick Raif Jarrett-England-1813) - VG
Jenkins, Rebecca - 2nd in series
Quercus, ©2010, UK Trade Paperback - ISBN: 9781849162333

Death of a Radical is a happy amalgam of historical romance and crime thriller set against the landscape of northern England two hundred years ago. Unusually, the characters really seem to be different in their attitudes and thoughts to our modern selves - too many historical novels are peopled by modern misses in period dresses who betray their let-it-all-hang-out 21st century mind-set in spite of their ferocious corsets. Ms Jenkins' characters live and breathe in a satisfactorily different manner (sometimes literally, as she manages a graphic rendition of an asthma attack in the days before inhalers...). From this perspective I especially enjoyed our impeccable heroine(Miss Henrietta Lonsdale)'s, excursion to a play put on in the local barn. "The Beggars Opera" is unusually performed uncut, and Henrietta has to witness a scene featuring some `ladies of the town'. Miss Lonsdale is reduced to staring at her gloves but later she forgets to be shocked by Lucy Lockit's unwed pregnancy. The characters are written as really belonging to a distant past but they share enough similarity in motivation to ourselves for us to care about their fates. The young asthmatic aristocrat who comes to the North for the first time and forms radical sympathies with the hard-pressed craftsmen who are about to lose their livelihoods to the new weaving machines is very engaging. Ms Jenkins gives him a believable mixture of naivety and intellectual grasp of the political situation.

I'm not a great plotting fan but the twists and turns that follow the young man's arrival in a small market town in a remote northern Dale seem well thought through with plenty of hints and clues to engage the mystery-solving reader. The joy of the book for me is the description of the moorland landscape which comes to life in all its harshness and stark beauty and the rendering of the people who are formed by it. The portraits of the rough weavers and poachers of the Dale are sharply drawn and the details of country life (I loved the ferreting scenes) are really well drawn. There is such a thorough grasp of the historical timeline and backdrop of wider events that the narrative seems to spring naturally out of its contemporary setting complete with vivid detail.

The contrast between the hero Raif Jarrett's two love interests is perhaps a tad conventional. Henrietta Lonsdale is a lively portrait but must she always be so exquisitely dressed ("her shawl draped itself in fluid folds down her back") and do everything so perfectly; her seat on a horse is, what else, "excellent"? Bess Tallentyre in the sexy, but definitely improper, wench part is just a bit too loose to Henrietta's relentless ladylike. Both characters transcend the slightly stereotypical Madonna/Whore roles they are cast in, Henrietta finally unbending a little in her condoning of the local lesbian dalliance. Raif himself is an engaging hero with plenty of charm and dash. Ms Jenkins introduces a surprising complexity to his character by making him capable of unexpectedly dark deeds when conventional justice is conveniently unavailable.

A rompingly good read overall, with enough ongoing tension between our hero and heroine to leave me looking forward to their no doubt ongoing encounters in Ms Jenkins' eagerly anticipated follow up to "Death of a Radical".

Take a fascinating historical era, weave it skilfully with a fast paced plot and strong, vivid characters, then set it the stunning North Eastern landscape - one of England's most beautiful - and you have CWA author Rebecca Jenkins' latest action-packed page turner, told with her usual skill, humour and cunning sub-plotting.

Bad times in England. High unemployment, wage cuts, the nation engaged in an apparently never-ending war, workers being deskilled, bloody protests in the streets - so many of the issues faced by the Georgians two hundred years ago are with us today.

If you like well plotted, historically accurate mystery (think: C. J. Sansom, Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe, Patrick O'Brian's Master & Commander or Candace Robb's Owen Archer series), then you'll enjoy the exploits of this most modern of heroes, Frederick Raif Jarrett: Renaissance man, retired Army spy and recently appointed land agent for the estate of the Duke of Penrith. But the capable returning soldier rapidly finds himself stretched, as he faces the politics and peculiar demands of his new life in the family business in provincial Woolbridge. Past and present soon collide, with the arrival of a company of touring actors and his idealistic young cousin, Grub, Jarrett's new charge, fresh from London.

The Easter fairs are coming to town and the peasants are revolting - or so some fear. Against this backdrop of unrest, class conflict and conspiracy, three men meet their end in quick succession. Jarrett's suspicions about the deaths send him on an avenging mission, pitting him against old rivals, the local magistrate and the MP, who prefer to blame natural causes.

FRJ's first outing rightly attracted great reviews from the Sunday Telegraph and Historical Novels Society. You don't need to read The Duke's Agent to follow Death of A Radical (which picks up six months down the track), but it adds to the experience - and why turn down a good read? Appropriately for a modern man like Mr Jarrett, Death of a Radical is already available on Kindle (The Duke's Agent to follow) and there's a good supporting website for the series of FR Jarrett Mysteries too.

Don't let the misleading soppy-pastel cover put you off. This is history-mystery at its best - and good news for serial hounds, the third episode, in the adventures of FR Jarrett is apparently on its way.