Title- The Devil and the Dark Water
Author- Stuart Turton
Series- N/A
Published- 2020
Page Count- 548 pages (UK paperback)
Publishing House- Sourcebooks Landmark
Genre- murder mystery, supernatural, crime and detective
Rating-4/5 stars
About the Author
Stuart lives in London with his amazing wife and daughter. He drinks lots of tea. What else?
When he left university he went travelling for three months and stayed away for five years. Every time his parents asked when he’d be back he told them next week, and meant it. Stuart is not to be trusted. In the nicest possible way. He’s got a degree in English and Philosophy, which makes him excellent at arguing and terrible at choosing degrees.
Having trained for no particular career, he has dabbled in most of them. He stocked shelves in a Darwin bookshop, taught English in Shanghai, worked for a technology magazine in London, wrote travel articles in Dubai, and now he’s a freelance journalist. None of this was planned, he just kept getting lost on his way to other places.
He likes a chat. He likes books. He likes people who write books and people who read books. He doesn’t know how to write a biography, so should probably stop before he tells you about his dreams or something. It was lovely to meet you, though. Stuart's debut novel is called The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle in the UK and The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle in the US. They're the same book. Don't fret.
Taken from Goodreads.
Plot
A murder on the high seas. A detective duo. A demon who may or may not exist.
It's 1634 and Samuel Pipps, the world's greatest detective, is being transported to Amsterdam to be executed for a crime he may, or may not, have committed. Traveling with him is his loyal bodyguard, Arent Hayes, who is determined to prove his friend innocent. But no sooner are they out to sea than devilry begins to blight the voyage. A twice-dead leper stalks the decks. Strange symbols appear on the sails. Livestock is slaughtered.
And then three passengers are marked for death, including Samuel. Could a demon be responsible for their misfortunes? With Pipps imprisoned, only Arent can solve a mystery that connects every passenger onboard. A mystery that stretches back into their past and now threatens to sink the ship, killing everybody on board.
The breathtaking new novel from Stuart Turton, author of the The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, winner of the Costa Best First Novel Award.
Also taken from Goodreads.
Opinions
In 2018, I was trying to find a copy of the Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and I stumbled across the Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle instead. I realised it was not the same book, but the blurb intrigued me, so I bought it. I read it and I knew that this was an author I wanted to read from again. Stuart Turton is a very clever writer. He crafts these clever mysteries that feel fresh and unique. I'd highly recommend reading his first book as it's an incredibly good mystery. So when I saw he had written another book, I patiently waited for it to come out in paperback. I thought this was as good, if not better than his first book.
I just kept on wanting to read more. There were so many layers to this mystery that it kept you hooked from beginning to end. You had to know if each mystery was connected and what lay around the corner for these characters. I read it in 8 days, some days I would easily read almost 100 pages, where as others I would read a chapter or two. I think for a book of this size and complexity, I'm happy with how quick I read it. It's always a good sign to me if you want to read more and have that "one more chapter" mentality with a book.
I adored the enclosed setting of this book. Aside from action at the very beginning and end, this mostly took place on a ship. That really added to the mystery and creepy elements of this book. The ship was the perfect location for a mystery like this as while it had limited places for the action to take place, there was also enough variation in the settings. You really felt trapped alongside those characters and that danger was lurking near by. Some of the action, such as the leper appearing outside Sara's cabin, was so good because until it was revealed how it was done, you genuinely couldn't figure it out as a reader.
Speaking of the characters, I really liked Sara and Arent. Let's talk about Arent first. He was definitely the John Watson to Sammy Pipps' Sherlock Holmes. Yet he also felt like his own character. Like Turton's mysteries, his characters also have layers. The backstory of Arent's father and his time as a soldier really added to his character. He also felt real because he was balanced in believing in his own abilities and experiencing periods of doubt. I also really liked Sara. She was a strong, practical woman, but she was also a realist. In a time when a woman's role was to raise children and do her duties to the family, she had just enough spark to feel bright, but also knew when to be sensible and look out for herself and her daughter. She always put her daughter's interests first, even if that meant having to encourage her to hide her intelligence. Sara and Arent compliment each other nicely, making for an excellent detective duo. Their romance was a bit rushed, but as they worked well and seemed to care for each other, I didn't mind as much.
Probably the main reason I didn't give this book five stars was that I didn't really like the ending. I had personally been holding out for a big supernatural reason as to why these terrible things had been happening and in the end it came back to the people on the ship. The reveal that Sara's best friend killed her husband because she was one of the wronged people from the witch hunter past was okay. What I didn't like was that Sammy was actually her brother. He was a very interesting figure as a detective, but to learn that he had done all of that so he could get back at someone didn't sit right with me. I did like the idea of them going off and righting more wrongs as a little team. But the overall reveal as to why all these things happened and so many people died didn't blow me away. I just wanted something a bit spookier and I didn't quite get those vibes.
I am very excited to see what Stuart Turton will write next as he just keeps on bouncing from strength to strength and having such interesting ideas. I wasn't a big murder mystery fan before this, but if there are more mysteries to read like this, then I will be reading them. He has become an auto-buy author for me.
What did you think of The Devil and the Dark Water??
