Thank you Vintage publishing for a copy of this book. I really don’t know to start this review. Set in the late Victorian era in London between the filth, music halls and prostitution Elizabeth Cree is arrested for murdering her husband John Cree. The story tells of what happens before. Firstly, Elizabeth who was previously Lambeth marsh Lizzie and Comedian Dan Leno and their life in the music halls. And The macabre tale of a murderer called the Lime House Golem. There is also other characters in this story that are real life, like Karl Marx and Charles Babbage.
The author has expertly written this story. That, makes you feel like you are there in that era. I just thought that the story got a bit confusing in the middle and because of this I got a bit bored. I really wanted to like this book, as I have seen the trailer of the film that is based on this book and it’s looks good. 3 stars for me.

I was hooked from the opening pages of The Limehouse Golem and could not stop reading, utterly gripped.

Comparisons are easily made between the events in this book and the infamous Jack the Ripper. I rarely read historical fiction especially historical crime but this fantastic book has encouraged me to seek out more.

Ackroyd brings Victorian London to brilliant, brutal and vivid life; the dark alleys, the disease, the filth, the whores, the blend of light and dark. It’s rare that an author creates something so atmospheric and real.

The Limehouse Golem is dark, bloody and thoroughly enjoyable.

I loved the way the book was structured with straight-forward narrative interwoven with disturbing journal entries by the murderer and transcripts of Elizabeth Cree’s trial for her husband’s murder. This worked really well.

The Limehouse Golem is brilliant. Now I really want to watch the movie.

When the opening chapter relates the hanging of 31 year old Elizabeth Cree, you can't help but want to know the events that led up to it. I liked the inclusion of the extracts from her trial and her husband's diary. Overall I enjoyed the story but I have to say that there were parts of the narrative that just didn't hold my attention. It was very easy to picture the music hall scenes and the London street life and I can understand why it has been made into a movie (and I plan on seeing it).

Once in a while, there comes a long a book which floors you, surprises you and grabs you by the throat until you finish it - and even then leaves you choking, feelings its affects long after the Golem's fingers have left your throat.
I felt a nervous wreck at the end - boy what a ride this was - a mix of fact and fiction - cleerly woven in to the story (probably with black gothic silk) to show Karl Marx and the world of the Victorian theatre in a tale of urder and legend. All of the events take place only 8 years before Jack the Ripper terrorised the city, and as the readers knows what's to come in that story - the grotty and murderous London is. like a gothic masterpiece, being painted in angry strips of shadows. One major master stroke of course is the link to the very real Ratcliffe Highway Murders - the story of the murders, the bodies and the woman awaiting to be hung....

None of this is light reading but what a world created in a relatively short number of pages. It feels and reads like a much longer and detailed novel. I admire a writer who can do this - each word counts, gives an image, paints a picture and then smacks you in the face.

Gory but what a setting, a story and a myth all rolled in to one. Not to be read at any time after sun down. You need sunlight to get through this. And people around you who aren't actors in any shape or form. Maybe not even read it close to a theatre....this novel haunts and lingers and I for one was staring at that stage where the action was taking place and you could hear a pin drop...

An accused and convicted murderer, 31 year old Elizabeth Cree, was to face her final audience, only a small selected crowd had been hand picked for the purpose and being the performer she was she wouldn’t let it pass and so she spoke her last words, before the noose tightened , “Here we are again”. The date is 6th April 1881 and the place is Camberwell Prison London.
The story drops back to be pieced together from the trial of Elizabeth Cree, the diaries of her deceased husband and her own story leading up to her death. Set in the East End of London in the 1800’s the streets are paved with filth and the air is laced with smog but if some of the residents could scrape enough money together there was an escape, just for a little while. A trip across the Thames paying a penny to the ferry man delivered the theatres and a comical look at life together with a sing song for all. On one of these nights, 10th September 1880,  June Quig was murdered, ok a dead body in London, a prostitute at that and on the poorer side of the Thames, not really breaking news except in the way she was displayed. As a second murder victim soon follows, grotesquely disfigured and displayed again, the killer gained a name this time, The Limehouse Golem.
This is some wicked story that throws you about as a reader and whoa what a macabre killing machine this person is. No hesitation, no regret, no idea who is doing this. A work of art to be shared. The Golem is a fictional character created from myths as an artificial being by magicians or a Jewish Rabi in the 15th century. Now mobs were heard running through the streets after seeing the Golem for it only to disappear, but the police worked from evidence and facts alone not hysteria. But the body count continued to rise.
This book has now been made into a big screen film to be released very soon and if it is anything to go by it is going to be tremendous Block Buster. Peter Ackroyd created two sides of Victorian London, one where the poor went to the theatre to laugh and forget their lives and the other where fantasy retold the horrors of the outside in the theatre to make the poor accept the tragedies easier.
The murders, although totally macabre have a sort of morbid fascination about their execution as you glimpse how this killer’s mind works and how what is happening is seen through their eyes. It isn’t a place you want to stay for long.  The Victorian Music Halls were the sanity for the poor of London and were stars were created like Dan Leno, was one of the funniest performers of his time. This is a book built on atmosphere and was already easy to play in my mind as I read. I love to read a book before I see the film as it makes for a more intense viewing. I have been in this killers mind …………………..
I wish to thank the publisher for an invitation to read this novel, this review is an honest reflection of my thoughts.

This is a marvellously macabre nineteenth century Victorian historical crime fiction. The central and strongest character is London itself, a city sharply divided by the wretched poverty of the poor and their desperately precarious lives and the well to do. The author transports us to the atmospheric streets of London, with its stench, its fogs, its bawdy houses, the theatres and the music halls. Limehouse is a district marked by its poverty, murderers are buried (covered in lime) and born here. It is the scene for a number of strange killings over a short period of time attributed to a golem, breeding intense fear in the populace and attracting intense media attention. Golem is a medieval Jewish word for an artificial being bought into existence by a magician or a rabbi. Limehouse is the kind of area where such a mythical being would appear. Famous luminaries from the time appear, such as the author George Gissing, Karl Marx and the music hall star, Dan Leto. Part of the narrative gives us the killer's diary.

The story begins with the hanging of Elizabeth Cree, Lambeth Marsh Lizzie, in April 1881 in Camberwell Prison. She was found guilty and convicted of the murder of John Cree, her husband, by poisoning. We then go back in time to learn of her life, the desperate poverty of her childhood, her tenacious ability to improve her life, her introduction to the theatre and music hall, where she is mentored by the great Dan Leto, and how she meets her husband. The string of Limehouse murders occur, apparently out of the blue, with seemingly no rhyme and reason, attributed locally to a golem, whilst a frenzy of fear runs rife through the community. Karl Marx looks into the Jewish legend of the golem. The police, courtesy of H Division, find themselves at a loss, whilst the media mock Chief Inspector Kildare. As it soon becomes clear, there is reason for the murders.....

Peter Ackroyd does an impressive job in recreating Victorian London and making it come gloriously alive, its culture, the baseness, the hard lives, the literary and philosophic swirl, and expertly incorporates leading figures of the time into the book. This and the rich characterisation makes this an irresistable read, which has now been turned into a major film starring the wonderful Bill Nighy. After reading this, I cannot wait to see it! Many thanks to Random House Vintage for an ARC.

Having seen the trailer for the new film they are making of this book, I was quite excited when I was invited to read a review copy by the Publisher via Netgalley.
Set in London in 1880, it was obviously going to be very different to the usual modern day crime fiction I usually devour and I do have to admit to taking a wee while to really get into the swing of things. Not too long though as the author has the act of time and scene setting off to a fine art and it wasn't long before I found myself totally immersed in the era depicted in the book.
We start with the scene of a hanging. One Elizabeth Cree, convicted of killing her husband. The book then rewinds back to Elizabeth's childhood and we are given various accounts of the time leading up to the initial event. We see how Elizabeth grew up, how she discovered the wonderful world of the theatre and how she made a better life for herself. We see how she met her husband and what happened after they married. We also follow several other characters and see their interaction with true life characters from the era seamlessly injected into this story. I am not 100% familiar with all the real characters and their parts in history so I can't say it was all true and that no liberties were taken, but within my limited knowledge, all was completely credible.
The Golem of the title is a ripperesque character who is wreaking havoc around the London are of Limehouse. As the book progresses we see that the apparent random nature of these killings is actually not and, we see them committed by the killer by way of both narrative and also through excerpts from the killer's own diary and we also see the way that others are affected by way of what is being reported in the media. I found all these methods of imparting information to be very effective.
I've already mentioned the author's talent for scene setting but I have to expand and say that he did a great job with his depiction of London in that era. The sights, the smells, the poverty and ways of living really came through in the writing. Especially the parts depicting the theatre and music halls and it took me right back to the times I used to watch The Good Old days with my family. Happy days indeed.
All in all, a brilliant journey back in time with some familiar old faces and some great new ones. All playing their parts in a rather intriguing and interesting story which ended perfectly. I am now really interested in seeing what they do in the film version and can't wait to see how that turns out. Fingers crossed!

*3.5 STARS*

Late Victorian London was famous for it's thick fogs and filthy cobbled streets where one could easily get lost in the myriad alleyways of the city. However, if you were a brutal serial killer, then the fog would be of great merit!

With echoes of Jack The Ripper, fact and fiction walk hand in hand as real historical characters appear in this tale of murder most foul.

By way of the trial of Elizabeth Cree, (charged with the murder of her husband by poisoning ), the story flows effortlessly from courtroom to music hall, and out to the streets and alleyways of Limehouse. The inhabitants of this slum district are among the poorest in London, and it has more than it's fair share of criminals.

Our serial killer is nicknamed The Limehouse Golem, and as the victim count increases, numerous suspects are brought in for questioning. This begins to look like a who's who, with many famous names in the frame - Karl Marx, Dan Leno ( THE most famous music hall player ) and George Gissing ( novelist and tutor )

Peter Ackroyd leads us by the hand through Victorian London's mean streets and alleyways, so that you can almost smell those putrid thoroughfares, can almost hear the clip clop of horses hooves on the cobbled streets, and it's not difficult to see what a scary place this was - add a serial killer into the mix and you have unquestionable terror right there. The only criticism I have is that I found some of the narrative overly long, but it has wonderful atmosphere, and a neat little twist at the end.

**Soon to be released as a movie starring Bill Nighy**

*Thank you to Random House UK, Vintage Publishing for my ARC in exchange for an honest review*