FANS of crime fiction will be fascinated, intrigued and delighted by Kate Summerscale’s The Suspicions of Mr Whicher or The Murder at Road Hill House, a book which combines a riveting account of one of the most notorious murders of the Victorian age with a gripping history of the birth of the detective, the development of the detective novel and an illuminating expose of the mores of the age.

When Jack Whicher, the most celebrated detective of his day, is sent to Road Hill House to investigate the gruesome murder of three-year-old Saville Kent, he immediately finds himself at odds with the local police, unable to agree with their hastily drawn conclusions about the perpetrator of a particularly violent crime. The one thing that is almost certainly true is that the murderer is a member of the household. But when Whicher reveals the results of his examination of what scant evidence there is, his conclusion is greeted with outrage and disbelief.

The case, which would provide inspiration for Edgar Alan Poe, Wilkie Collins and Charles Dickens, created a maelstrom of attention and endless column inches in the hundreds of newspapers which had appeared in the 1850s with a huge accompanying rise in crime reporting. “The new journalists shared much with the detectives: they were seen alternately as crusaders for truth and as sleazy voyeurs.”

When the family - Samuel Kent and his second wife, Mary and their three children together with his four children from his first marriage and three live-in staff - went to bed on the night of June 30, 1860, the elegant house was securely locked and bolted. By the morning, when Saville’s disappearance was discovered, the drawing-room door was found to be unlocked, “the shutters unfastened, and the window a little way up”. Was this a clue, or a distraction? The unravelling of the case proves impossible, with Whicher declaring that it would not be solved until his prime suspect confessed, a prediction that proved correct. Indeed, it was only after the deaths of most of those involved that the whole truth could be guessed at.

Part detective story, part social history, The Suspicions of Mr Whicher proves a satisfying read on many levels, written in the manner of a detective novel, but with not a word invented and offering a wealth of information about the Victorian age and evidence that human nature changes very little with the passing of the centuries.

“It is amazing that it encompasses all that information while at the same time being a page-turner,” she said. “The plot and the social observation are so well dealt with that you are hardly aware that you are learning all this stuff,” said Rosie Boycott, chair of the judging panel which awarded The Suspicions of Mr Whicher this year’s Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction. It is also the Galaxy Book of the Year 2009.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Kate Summerscale is the author of the bestselling The Queen of Whale Cay, about ‘Joe’ Carstairs, ‘fastest woman on water’, which won the Somerset Maugham Award in 1998 and was shortlisted for the 1997 Whitbread Awards for biography.

She is the former literary editor of The Daily Telegraph and has also judged various literary competitions including the Booker Prize in 2001.

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WIN A WATERSTONE’S GIFT CARD

Let us know what you think about The Suspicions of Mr Whicher and you could win a £10 Waterstone’s gift card. Email your review to htleisure@midlands.newsquest.co.uk or post it to HTBook Group, Hereford Times, Holmer Road,Hereford HR4 9UJ, with yourname, address and contact details. Usual competition rules apply. Deadline is midnight on Monday, June 1.

The winner of the £10 Waterstone’s gift card, for her review of The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry is Stella Sterry of Burghhill: "As Dr Grene becomes interested in Rosanne’s case he turns to medical archives to try to find out more about his patient and believes that he is discovering the truth. When Dr Grene, towards the end of the book, is privy to Roseanne McNulty’s own account of her life, he sees that it conflicts, in some respects, with the official accounts and ‘testimony’ from witnesses.

"But which is truth? Is one ‘wrong’?

"As a psychiatrist he realises that maybe we need to sanitise the traumatic events in our lives in order to survive them. Our memories play with, and manipulate truth.

"The book has an enthralling but disturbing tale to tell. The characters are rounded and rightly earn our sympathy.

"A good novel should be thought provoking and show some of the moral complexities of our lives. The Secret Scripture does this and leaves one with the knowledge that happiness is possible even after the saddest happenings. We can continue to grow as human beings."

HOW TO ORDER

The Suspicions of Mr Whicher, £7.99, offer price, £7.59, post and packing free. To order, call the Hereford Times Bookshop on 08700 713317 or send your cheque/postal order made payable to Hereford Times Bookshop to: Hereford Times Bookshop, PO Box 60, Helston, TR13 0TP. Allow seven to 10 working days for delivery. Titles supplied subject to availability. Order online at sparkledirect.com