Having read 'The Vesuvius Club' I couldn't wait to get my teeth into the second installment of Lucifer Box and his thrilling adventures. Having been busy this book took me an embarrassingly long time to read, but it kept me coming back for more as any good book should. As the previous book was set in the Edwardian era (Mark was never very clear it could have been anything from 1901-1910) a different time period was an interesting change that gave way to new parts of history. 1920's New York city. I liked the change in era and found the time difference was an enjoyable if not clever move. (Mark could always write others filling in the 20 year gap after all. *begs any and all deities he does*). So good ol' Lucy is 20 years older but from his insistent inner monologue he is still as strapping and gorgeous as first envisioned if not slightly aged. (I think someone needs to inform Mr. Box that men like fine wine get better with age... Or at least that's what I seem to find.) As always Lucifer is daring, heroic and an amazingly written character. As before I found myself sucked right in and dashing along side the man eager to find out what was happening. I adored the new characters and the way each one mattered. The way Mark never wastes even a word astounds me. No matter how small each character served something to the plot and what a plot it was. In my opinion The Vesuvius Club left Mark a tall order in which he brilliantly filled. Whilst the books are completely different in plot they are still both astounding, everything matters, there aren't lose ends left behind. The man is an artist, his craft is beautiful and I am in love with every page. To me Mark doesn't provide just a story it's an experience, a lesson. So as always a thank you to Mark Gatiss I am indebted to you yet again, you've given me yet another beautiful literary experience.
Copied from my blog:The Devil in Amber is the second book in the "Lucifer Box" series, but author Gatiss is deft enough with description that there's no need at all to have read the first book (it will certainly deepen the experience, though). The setting is the 1920s in New York City and the English countryside, and the plot is pure adventure spy novel with tongue very, very firmly in cheek. The main character, Lucifer Box (all the characters have similarly fantastic names) is a secret agent and a portrait painter, and he's starting to have to admit that's he's hit middle age and is slowing down. That doesn't affect his high opinion of himself, though, nor does it seem to interfere with his love life (readers who are offended by homoeroticism be warned--though the sex is mostly offstage or only described in very general terms, it's definitely present in both hetero and homo forms).The adventure this time involves more than one improbable group of secret agents (one is hidden as the Royal Art Academy and another is based at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, while the bad guys are called F.A.U.S.T.), and a plot to release the very devil from captivity using an invocation written on a scrap of very old silk and the sacrifice of the perfect "lamb"--a woman who happens to be Lucifer Box's love interest. It could all degenerate into a silly-but-fun slapstick comedic adventure, but Gatiss's sheer skill with language somehow makes the whole ridiculous mess into a lush, exciting, readable tale that transcends its genre. Track down this series and read them all.
What do You think about The Devil In Amber (2007)?
If you don't know Mark Gatiss, you should probably check out the British TV show A League of Gentlemen first, just to get into the right frame of mind for this romper. You don't have to read The Vesuvius Club first, although it is set about 20 years prior to this one. It might add to the amusement.First sentence of the book:"He was an American, so it seemed only fair to shoot him."And the 5th sentence of page 23 (I'm pretty sure you've done that before, too....):"Vetting recruits for evidence of transvestism?"So be prepared for a very silly, gay and entertaining crime novel delving into the supernatural just a wee bit. Good fun! Next one is on my wishlist already.
—Cathy (cathepsut)
Lucifer Box - portraitist, and terribly good secret agent - is feeling his age. Assigned to observe the activities of fascist leader Olympus Mons and his fanatical Amber Shirts in a snow-bound 1920s New York, Box finds himself framed for a vicious murder. Using all his native cunning, Box escapes aboard a vessel bound for England armed only with a Broadway midget's suitcase and a string of unanswered questions. What lies hidden in the bleak Norfolk convent of St Bede? What is 'the lamb' that Olympus Mons searches for in his bid for world domination? And what has all this to do with a medieval prayer intended to summon the Devil himself? From the glittering sophistication of Art Deco Manhattan to the eerie Norfolk coast and the snow-capped peaks of Switzerland The Devil in Amber takes us on a thrilling ride that pits Lucifer Box against the most lethal adversary of his career : the Prince of Darkness himself.
—Erik Moloney
I was hugely disappointed with this book. I enjoyed its predecessor 'The Vesuvius Club' so much that I raced through it in a day and went straight onto the second in the series. Unfortunately it suffers by comparison. A lot.What made the first book such a good read was the dry humour of the narrative style and the characterisation of the delightfully bad Lucifer Box, but both of these key features were decidedly patchy in 'The Devil in Amber'. It has moments of brilliance (who could fail to be drawn in by the fantastic opening line, 'He was an American, so it seemed only fair to shoot him'?) but these are well-hidden among standard dross. Mark Gatiss seems to do a lot more telling the reader what was happening than letting us see it coloured through Lucifer's disdainful perspective. It was like reading a book written to be made into a film rather than read and appreciated as a novel. It remains a fun read, but I sincerely hope that the third installment lives up to the standards of the first book and not the second.
—Katie
