Review copy courtesy of Faber via NetGalley - many thanks for the opportunity to read this terrific novel.

A really engaging tale of adventure in early Manhattan that rollicks along at a cracking pace as our hero gets caught up in one scrape after another. The language used gives us an overwhelming sense of the 18th century and the atmosphere of the place is at the forefront - the architecture of Amsterdam and London without the crowding or the formality. Writing of great originality - one little quote: ‘The snow of streets was rammed by feet, drilled with holes where passers-by had pissed, and printed by horses’ hooves in confused stanzas of c’s, n’s and u’s’ - entertained me throughout.

The mystery of Smith’s mission is well maintained until the latter half of the book when hints become more pointed and I found the ending perfectly satisfying in the most important respect. But (and without elaborating for fear of spoiling it for others) I thought there was just one twist too many at the end and I found it detracted from the book’s overall impact.

A great read, though, and I’ll be recommending it as widely as I can.

Just brilliant. You’ll never doubt for a moment that you are in 1746 New York – an English colony with a heavy Dutch influence, and slavery still the standard. The novel opens suddenly as twenty-four-year-old Richard Smith arrives from London with a promissory note for £1000, an astounding sum for the time. He won’t explain how he came by the money or what he intends to do with it, but the order seems to be legitimate. This puts the merchant Mr. Lovell in rather a bind, because that kind of cash simply can’t be come by.

Before he can finally get his money, Smith will fall in and out of love, fight a duel, and be arrested twice – all within the space of two months. (“There is something maddeningly predictable about the way you procure disaster, Richard.”) In a book full of fantastic scenes, a few particularly stand out: Smith and Septimus’ narrow escape via the rooftops on Pope Day, a Dutch Santa Claus delivering personalized Christmas poems, and Smith’s trial, especially his lawyer’s comically staccato defense. Along with Septimus, Lovell’s irritable daughter Tabitha is another gem of a character. There are also great surprises awaiting the reader concerning Smith’s identity and the narration.

The finest thing about the novel, though, is the language: it’s authentic eighteenth-century diction (including scenes from an Addison play) that I imagine will please fans of that period’s literature [I hardly know the period at all, so it felt to me like Dickensian prose avant la lettre], yet it’s always accessible. I loved a description of the East River being encased in ice, but greatest of all is the letter Smith writes his father from jail.

Spufford is far and away the best at reading aloud of any author I’ve seen in person; he has a real theatrical gift for intonation and different characters’ voices. While I had slight trouble understanding the historical finances underpinning the novel, and questioned at the end whether the plot was too far-fetched, through it all I could hear Spufford’s animated voice delighting in the words and the story. This reminded me of Parrot and Olivier in America by Peter Carey and The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell. Like those two, it’s bawdy, witty and vivid historical fiction. Spufford also writes very good creative nonfiction, with five books to date, but with his debut novel he’s hit a home run.

Here’s two representative passages:
“‘Service!’ he cried, entering a long low room canopied with smoke, diversified with steam, where men (all men) conversed in a gruff murmur that rose and fell like a masculine sea. At an unoccupied table he bounced into a chair and settled with a wide spread of knees, a confident sprawl of legs, a benignant beaming in all directions.”

(from Smith’s letter) “He has a Nose swollen to the Likeness of a Piece of Crimson Fruit, ornament’d by as many black Pores as there are Seeds upon a Strawberry; and a Skin of sunburn’d leather otherwise, much pock’d and mottl’d; and verminous Hair as long as his Shoulders depending from a bald Pate”