Chad Hobbes went to law school in England, but never wrote the bar exam. In 1868, he has come to British Columbia, a British colony, but not yet part of Canada (which was just recently formed in the east), but without having written the bar, he cannot practice as a lawyer, so he gets a job as a constable in Victoria. When an American “alienist” (psychiatrist - I had to look it up!) is found murdered in a very gruesome way, everyone assumes it’s the First Nations people who are closeby who killed him. One is arrested and it is assumed he will soon hang for it. Hobbes, though, doesn’t think he (nor any of the other natives) did it, and he sets out to find who really did it. In the meantime, Hobbes finds himself attracted to the sister of the man who was arrested.

Be warned: this was quite gruesome in the details. Also, there was a lot of investigation into sexual things. There is definite racism here, primarily against native people. Overall, I’m rating this ok. There were parts that just didn’t interest me, so I kind of tuned out, but other parts were fine and I followed without an issue. I’m thinking maybe the writing style? The odd thing is that I love historical fiction, I also like mysteries (though some types more than others), but oddly, more often than not, historical mysteries don’t interest me as much. I have no idea why.

I did like the Canadian background in this, though. I’ve been to Victoria a couple of times, so I could picture some of the places mentioned. There was an odd (I thought) twist and I felt like the end was a bit too much all tied up – except for one thing. That one thing wasn’t a happy one (and it was apparently a real event). The brief afterword also explained that many of the people were real people. ( )

This is a very good work of historical fiction and a marginally less good historical mystery. Haldane takes his time with the setting and the characters, which really fleshes out the book and brings the past to life, and there’s at least as much “development of Chad Hobbes” as there is “development of mystery”. I liked that, but then, I usually do. The murder mystery also works pretty well, in the slow British police procedural way, and wends its way through all areas of colonial life, and the clues didn’t really slot into any particular shape until the very end. (I like that in a mystery too.) However, there were a few moments where the clues ended up feeling justified after the fact, or deliberately obtuse to keep the mystery going, and that’s where this book dropped a half-point for me.

Also, there’s historical racism, mostly anti-Native but some anti-Black, but Hobbes never quite subscribes the way everyone else does and learns to see past the prejudices in any case. Haldane definitely has no patience for racism.

6.5/10 ( )

Historical, British author – set in Canada) 3 star rating

It might be stretching it a bit to say this was set in Canada because in 1869, the Pacific-bordering territory of British Columbia had not yet joined Confederation. Nonetheless, Chad Hobbes, newly arrived in Victoria, finds himself made a police detective and sent to investigate the death of Dr. McCrory, a new age doctor who was found stabbed with his cut-off penis in his hand (it had been in his mouth).

My notes tell me that I thought the period details were incredibly well-researched but that the author was trying too hard to be crude. There were heavy-handed red herrings to one of the suspects, and the actual murderer was someone only on the very peripheral of the story.

I was also disturbed by the details of Chad’s awareness of women as sexual beings once he was no longer a virgin. Are men so constantly thinking these things?

Overall, as a period history perhaps, but as a murder mystery poorly done. ( )

weird but not wonderful. Story set in British Columbia, indians, settlers, mysticism and violence. reviewed for booklist. ( )

I knew I’d be writing a review by the middle of THE DEVIL’S MAKING by Sean Haldane because it’s a fascinating story. Sadly the moment passed when I could write knowledgeably about the story, but I’m unwilling to let it go. Everyone should read this book!

THE DEVIL’S MAKING won the Arthur Ellis Award for Best Novel (2014).

The book opens in 1868 when Chad Hobbs travels from Britain to the tiny outpost of Victoria, capital of British Columbia. The trip takes four months because they must travel around Tierra del Fuego, the southern tip of South America. This is but one of the many “oddities” of life in the late 19th century and it doesn’t take long for the reader to feel like they belong to those rough and muddy times.

Chad becomes a policeman who must solve the murder of a local man. Naturally the townsfolk are quick to blame a native Indian and incarcerate him, but Chad is unwilling to accept such a “desirable” outcome without more facts.

One of the story’s joys is Chad’s philosophical understanding of what he discovers and what this means about life. Although I’ve never been much interested in history, I found this book delightful. ( )