{"id":4499,"date":"2019-06-26T11:52:33","date_gmt":"2019-06-26T06:22:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thebooksatchel.com\/?p=4499"},"modified":"2020-03-20T11:43:47","modified_gmt":"2020-03-20T06:13:47","slug":"things-in-jars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thebooksatchel.com\/things-in-jars\/","title":{"rendered":"Things in Jars \u2014 Victorian Crime Novel with Circus Freaks, Pickled Babies & Irish Folklore"},"content":{"rendered":"
The year is 1863 and London is suffocating in crime, violence, and grime, covered in a \u2018low, thick fog that has descended upon the city like an unwashed bedsheet\u2019. The Thames is murky, merrows influence the weather, circuses thrive, fortunes and gained (and lost) in the blink of an eye and the people love a good spectacle.<\/p>\n
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Red-haired Bridget \u2018Bridie\u2019 Devine, is the best female detective in the city. She wears a dagger strapped to her thigh and smokes, several concoctions, like a chimney. She has an admirer in the ghost of a tattooed boxer, Ruby Doyle, even though she is \u2018not in the market for haunting.\u2019 He sees her through her nightmares, lends a helping hand and has a mermaid tattoo (that often animates itself!). Cora Butter, a 7-ft tall, self-proclaimed, bearded housemaid (\u2018Bridie hasn\u2019t had a decent meal since\u2019), rescued from spending her life as a \u2018giantess in a bear cage\u2019 at a circus, is Bridie\u2019s sidekick.<\/p>\n
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