Genre: Mystery, History, Romance
LGBTQ+ Category: Gay
Reviewer: Ulysses
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About The Book
“The quiet ones have the loudest voice. Them as say most by speaking in silence.” -Fiona Hawkins, 1881
March 1891. A parliamentary committee arrives at Larkspur Hall to assess Lord Clearwater’s suitability to become an earl. Prince Albert Victor will announce their decision at a society dinner on Archer’s thirty-second birthday.
However, the MP with the authority to advance Archer to the title is the same man who caused Edward Hyde never to speak again. When the parliamentarians arrive to inspect the Larkspur Academy, Edward comes face to face with the man he had arrested for making unnatural advances. A man who was never tried for his crime.
Silas Hawkins and the academy men band together to ensure Edward sees justice done while protecting Lord Clearwater’s reputation and each other. Using their skills in chemistry, physics and deception, they embark on a game of secrets and subterfuge where the unspoken causes the loudest outcry.
Speaking in Silence is the fifth book in the Larkspur Mysteries series, and touches on themes of victimisation and suicide. Like all books in the series, it is inspired by actual events from the late 1800s. With themes of friendship, bromance, male love and revenge, the story is more of a ‘how dunnit?’ than a ‘who dunnit?’ and like all of Jackson’s mysteries, contains humour, while mixing fact with fiction.
The Review
As with all the books (so far) of this series, the author presents us with a puzzling mystery and a race against time to forestall a disaster; while combining it with a more intimate story of the residents of the Larkspur Academy. Using his gift for historical research to build an uncannily authentic world, Jackson Marsh gets our adrenaline flowing and our emotions rising. In a prologue, we see a shadowy politician meeting with a stranger in London’s East End slums. There we discover an old nemesis of Archer Riddington’s, and realize that something very unpleasant is afoot.
As plans are underway for Archer Clearwater’s 32nd birthday at the newly-built Savoy Hotel in London, a group of VIP visitors arrive at Larkspur Hall. This delegation has been sent by the Crown to do a final vetting of the young viscount and his good works before elevating his title to an earldom, something hinted at in an earlier book in the series.
Everything goes swimmingly until the group arrives from the Hall for a tour of Academy House. One of the current residents, young Edward Hyde, recognizes someone from his past, and flees the scene in terror. When the young men discuss what happened later on, the seriousness of the situation becomes clear.
Henry Hope, Edward’s closest friend, who was plucked with him from desperate poverty by Lord Clearwater’s agents, acts as Edward’s voice, since Edward refuses to speak to anyone but Henry. Together they must work with the men at the newly established Delamere Detective Agency to foil yet another plot to undo all the good that Archer and his crew are doing.
Why? The underlying painful truth that has emerged more than once in this series is that men in 19th-century Great Britain who are attracted to other men must lead lives of subterfuge and desperate loneliness. Some, like Archer Riddington, find a solution that aims to make the world a better place. Some, unfortunately, turn to destroying other men’s lives in order to maintain their camouflage. In a world of injustice and oppression, a false notion of ‘the greater good’ becomes a tool for cruelty and destruction.
The mystery plot is exciting; the more romantic story line is emotionally powerful. This is what Jackson Marsh does best, and we are all the better for it.
5 Stars.
The Reviewer
Ulysses Grant Dietz grew up in Syracuse, New York, where his Leave It to Beaver life was enlivened by his fascination with vampires, from Bela Lugosi to Barnabas Collins. He studied French at Yale, and was trained to be a museum curator at the University of Delaware. A curator since 1980, Ulysses has never stopped writing fiction for the sheer pleasure of it. He created the character of Desmond Beckwith in 1988 as his personal response to Anne Rice’s landmark novels. Alyson Books released his first novel, Desmond, in 1998. Vampire in Suburbia, the sequel to Desmond, is his second novel.
Ulysses lives in suburban New Jersey with his husband of over 41 years and their two almost-grown children.
By the way, the name Ulysses was not his parents’ idea of a joke: he is a great-great grandson of Ulysses S. Grant, and his mother was the President’s last living great-grandchild. Every year on April 27 he gives a speech at Grant’s Tomb in New York City.
