The Somnambulist by Jonathan Barnes

It's much harder for to review books that I want to say nice things about than ones that I feel like picking at. After all, what is a novel but a long piece of prose with something wrong with it? And so I've been staring at this screen, trying to put into words the squee! feeling that The Somnambulist gave me.

It's not perfect, by any means. If I felt like complaining, I'm sure I could think of things to complain about. But Jonathan Barnes's debut novel is just so much gosh-darn fun that complaining about it would be like kicking an orphan.

It's the turn of the last century, in London. Edward Moon is a stage magician, midway through a long slide out of fashion. He also is an accomplished consulting detective, of the Sherlock Holmes school -- the kind to whom the police come, wringing their hats in their hands, when they have a particularly baffling case. And he has a mysterious sidekick: the gigantic, silent figure known only as The Somnambulist, who never bleeds, who drinks only milk, whose origins are completely unknown.

(Despite the title, the book isn't really about The Somnambulist, though he is the most colorful blossom in The Somnambulist's bouquet. And don't expect to fully undertsand him by the end. But there I go, quibbling. )

Moon is bored, and has the feeling that the best part of his life is over. But then he's called in to consult on a particularly bizarre death, and a very baroque case begins. The case itself is a bit contrived, both within the fictional world and on Barnes's part, but that's entirely right -- this is a mannered story, heavily narrated, and very much a story being told.

I'm not sure what Barnes has been reading; I found The Somnambulist to be reminiscent of novels like The Lies of Locke Lamora, Perdido Street Station, and Scar Night -- but less wildly inventive than those books, perhaps damped down to fit into our real world. Not that such inventiveness is impossible in an Edwardian story -- witness the first two volumes of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. But there I go again...

Let me be honest: The Somnambulist does have problems, and some of them are quite large. However -- and this is the important part -- it's also got style to spare, and an insinuating, sneaky narrative voice that drags the reader along. It's narrated by a character who remains secret at the beginning but declares himself by the end -- and it's not the character I thought it might be.

Let me quote the first paragraph -- as a thousand other reviews will; it's that kind of grand, catchy opening -- to show you what I mean:

Be warned. This book has no literary merit whatsoever. It is a lurid piece of nonsense, convoluted, implausible, peopled by unconvincing characters, written in drearily pedestrian prose, frequently ridiculous and wilfully bizarre. Needless to say, I doubt you'll believe a word of it.

A book with that kind of style, an author with the guts to start that way -- we can forgive a lot when it comes packaged that way. And The Somnambulist doesn't require much forgiveness; just a willingness to dive headlong into an old-fashioned adventure story.

One last note: The Somnambulist is a historical thriller with some fantasy elements, rather than being a historical fantasy. Its roots are more outside of modern fantasy than within them, which readers should take into account when diving in. In other words: don't expect world-building, don't expect extrapolation. Expect a damn good trip through a never-was version of Edwardian London that you could recommend to your Aunt Hilda without second thoughts.