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Lucifer Box leads a double life (several double-lives, actually, but we'll get to that distinction later). By day, he's a painter, bon vivant and unrepentant sensualist who regards Edwardian London as his own personal playground. By night, however -- or whenever needs must -- he's a spy, assassin and all-around appendage of His Majesty's government.
The setup sounds familiar...because it is. Mark Gatiss, who took British TV comedy to new depths of depravity as one-fourth of The League of Gentlemen, and has written several Doctor Who novels (not to mention an episode of the upcoming new series), is an unabashed genre fan and has never been shy about his influences. Accordingly, The Vesuvius Club is a gleeful romp through a gallery of adventure story tropes; references to Sherlock Holmes (ahem, "The Adventure of the Devil's Foot", ahem), James Bond, Adam Adamant Lives!, Jason King and Doctor Who abound. There's still a serviceable story at the heart of all the nods and homages, but don't be surprised if you figure out a few of the twists before you get to them. It won't hurt the narrative -- and Gatiss has included a couple of corkers you probably won't guess 'til you get to them.
In the first volume of his "memoirs", Lucifer Box tackles a confounding mystery indeed: someone is killing Britain's most prominent vulcanologists (I'm quoting the jacket copy there, but it's such a neat summation of the primary plot that it's really unavoidable). Specifically, two of the three remaining members of a highly gifted group known as the "Cambridge Four" have been killed, and His Majesty's Government (this is the early 20th century, remember) would very much like that to stop before Britain has no volcano experts left. In his search for answers, Box encounters a sinister undertaker, an even more sinister Italian expatriate, a horribly disfigured woman with a mysterious past, and a host of other peculiar characters, many of them oddly, gratuitously or punnishly named. He's also pressed into service to aid his friend and fellow painter Christopher Miracle, who has been wrongly accused of murder. And as if that wasn't enough to keep Lucifer Box busy, someone is trying to kill him...
However, like any good British secret agent, Lucifer Box always has time to indulge his baser appetites. He's ready and willing to cavort with whores, but seems to prefer the more refined charms of London's upper-class daughters -- particularly his new art student, the charming and slightly mysterious Miss Bella Pok. That said, anyone who's aware of Mark Gatiss's own preferences won't be surprised to learn that, presented with a metapohorical rope, Box will cheerfully swing in the other direction as well. It's certainly a scandalous "reveal" by Edwardian standards, but the tone of the text, combined with Ian Bass's Aubrey Beardsley-esque illustrations, progresses steadily in that direction, implying far greater depths of decadence in Box's past.
Back to the story. The chase eventually takes Box to Naples, where, between interviewing the sole remaining member of the "Cambridge Four", exploring a mysterious opium den and falling afoul of the sinister Vesuvius Club, he has time to recruit a new valet (and then some) -- one Charlie Jackpot, who quickly becomes the book's equivalent of a Bond Girl. (At one point, Box refers to him as "Charlie Jackpot who seemed to require rescuing six times before breakfast.") It's at this point that the story grows abruptly more fantastic -- a distinct shift from Sherlock Holmes to James Bond. There's no need to give away too much of the plot; let's just say it involves a vast underground lair, volcanoes, opium and a particularly pervy pair of villains. Needless to say, the world is saved, mysteries are solved and the baddies get what's coming to them. And like any good Bond film, when it's all over, it isn't really over.
All told, it's an entertaining adventure story -- a nodding, winking romp through sci-fi and action movie tropes. Gatiss does this sort of referential material -- sometimes sly, sometimes blatant, sometimes absolutely shameless -- in a manner I generally find pleasing; ever since The League of Gentlemen gave a sidelong nod to Diamonds are Forever's gay assassins, Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd, I've felt as if he can do no wrong. His fantasy Edwardian era (perhaps inspired by "Frenzy of Tongs", the episode of Steve Coogan's Doctor Terrible's House of Horrible in which he guest-starred, and which features a few similar plot points) is a wonderful place, peopled by a variety of neatly-sketched grotesques and filled out with art references and bon mots. The "Domestics" are a particularly inspired creation: Box's agency underlings go about their business with all the casual stolidity of typical household servants, even when they're getting rid of dead bodies. Chief among the Domestics is Delilah, an enormous woman whose utter incongruity in, and businesslike approach to, all things espionage-related make her one of the book's best characters; she has a truly inspired scene in which she's forced into a very awkward position to extricate Box from a lethal trap. Delilah's absence from the novel's latter third is one of its few disappointments, particularly because the character who effectively replaces her, Charlie Jackpot, is rather unlikable -- cocksure (heh heh) but often cowardly and opportunistic. Hopefully, given Gatiss's intent to write a series of Lucifer Box novels, Charlie will become more endearing over the years.
0ne other gripe: The Vesuvius Club's big underground lair set piece lacks an entirely satisfying conclusion. For one thing, the final confrontation between Box and the story's villain seems a little bloodless -- not that every adventure-type book needs to culminate in a knock-down, drag-out fight to the death, but it could have been a more satisfying conclusion. Additionally, like the first few Harry Potter books (to which it otherwise bears no resemblance whatsoever), The Vesuvius Club relies upon a sort of hospital bed epilogue-cum-info-dump to settle its dangling plotlines. The last few pages are entertaining, though -- a decidedly modern-minded conclusion to a classic pulp tale. I'll hope for a bigger, better climax next time around... but then, doesn't everyone?
-- George Zahora
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About the Publisher:
Simon and Schuster is one of those monolithic publishing houses your mother warned you about.
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