Darker than dark but tonally lighter than light, this is a keeper and a bolt from nowhere, almost like an adult version of the Harry Potter books with a touch of Dickensian dystopia. Set in a Victorian England that never was, in which a person's evil thoughts and intentions manifest themselves through the black, heavy smoke that emanates from their body, this follows the discoveries and personal odysseys of a group of boarding school lodgers whose connection to the mystery of smoke is highly personal as they set on a quest to elucidate its origins and the web of conspiracies that surround the way the whole country is influenced by it. Evocative, a vision of a pre-industrialised Britain both pastoral and ominous, a London teeming with sin and horror, and a set of characters you keep cheering on in spite of their foibles and impetuosity, this is an old-fashioned book in the best way and a sheer delight. It will also scare the pants off of you in the process and have you averting your eyes even when you are dying to know what comes next and get an answer to all your questions (which you will by the end...). ~ Maxim Jakubowski
Maxim Jakubowski's September 2016 Book of the Month.
"e;The laws of Smoke are complex. Not every lie will trigger it. A fleeting thought of evil may pass unseen; a fib, an excuse, a piece of flattery. Next thing you know its smell is in your nose. There is no more hateful smell in the world than the smell of Smoke."e;England. A century ago, give or take a few years.An England where people who are wicked in thought or deed are marked by the Smoke that pours forth from their bodies, a sign of their fallen state. The aristocracy do not smoke, proof of their virtue and right to rule, while the lower classes are drenched in sin and soot. An England utterly strange and utterly real.An elite boarding school where the sons of the wealthy are groomed to take power as their birthright. Teachers with mysterious ties to warring political factions at the highest levels of government. Three young people who learn everything they've been taught is a lie - knowledge that could cost them their lives. A grand estate where secrets lurk in attic rooms and hidden laboratories. A love triangle. A desperate chase. Revolutionaries and secret police. Religious fanatics and coldhearted scientists. Murder. A London filled with danger and wonder. A tortured relationship between a mother and a daughter, and a mother and a son. Unexpected villains and unexpected heroes. Cool reason versus passion. Rich versus poor. Right versus wrong, though which is which isn't clear.This is the world of Smoke, a narrative tour de force, a tale of Dickensian intricacy and ferocious imaginative power, richly atmospheric and intensely suspenseful.
