"The Pickwick Murders" by Heather Redmond

If they are developing a series, most mystery writers today aim at writing the books in the series as standalone books. You can’t be sure how a reader will find your novels, so you work hard to tell enough of the series back story without either giving a reader a reason not to buy the earlier books to confusing or puzzling the reader. It’s true for general fiction as well; I can testify to the difficulty of writing a series with each book striking the right balance. 

British mystery author Heather Redmond has a series of novels – The Dickens of a Crime series, featuring none other than the Inimitable himself, Charles Dickens. When I bought The Pickwick Murders, I assumed something I shouldn’t have – that it was likely the first in the series, given that The Pickwick Papers was the first of Dickens books that collected the magazine serial publication into one novel. 

 

As it turns out, it’s the fourth in the series, preceded by A Tale of Two Murders, Grave Expectations, and A Christmas Carol Murder. And while The Pickwick Murders works as a standalone, it would have been better to have read it in its order of publication. There is missing background, especially about the villain of the story, that would have made the narrative more understandable. 

 

It's 1836. Dickens, engaged to Catherine (Kate) Hogarth, works as a newspaper reporter. His popularity is in the ascendant; his Sketches by Boz have made him an almost household name and it’s due to published in book form within weeks. Dickens is on assignment outside of London, covering an election for Parliament between a reformer and Sir Augustus Smirke, a somewhat loathsome Tory suspected of making off with a young servant girl. That charge is brought forward during the electioneering, and Dickens duly covers it for his newspaper. 

 

Heather Redmond

Back in London, Dickens discovers he’s been invited to join The Lightning Club, which he thinks is just the ticket for a young man on the rise. But when he shows up at the rather spooky museum for his initiation, he discovers he has to navigate a maze, mostly in the dark. And at the center of the maze is a murdered man, one Samuel Pickwick. When the police suddenly arrive, Dickens realizes he’s been framed. He’s taken to jail and then to Newgate Prison, which he’s previously written about but never thought of himself as a potential inhabitant.

 

Now it falls to Kate Hogarth to save her fiancée. What’s suspected is a case of revenge by Sir Augustus (who won his election and is a very powerful man indeed). But it’s more complex than that, and Kate finds herself being led all over London on a kind of literary treasure hunt – but one that could end in her beloved’s hanging.

 

In addition to the Charles Dickens novels, Redmond has also published more than 25 other mystery and romance novels under than name of Heather Hiestand. She lives in Washington State with her family.

 

The Pickwick Murders is a fun story, utilizing a number of names that will be familiar to fans of Dickens. But I would read it in the order it appears in the series.