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A review by captainfez
The Necropolis Railway by Andrew Martin
3.0
This is the first novel in the still-ongoing Jim Stringer series. It is also an unapologetic love-letter to life at the footplate. If you don't like trains, you probably should give this a miss. It's similar to the Patrick O'Brian Aubrey-Maturin series in terms of detail and research. I didn't find this off-putting, though others may. It's very much a Boys' Own style of writing - though given that this pretty accurately describes the narrator's maturity level, it's fine.
Other than the detailed train info - though I'm sure there's a trainspotter somewhere who's picked Martin up on some minute errors - the novel is a brief excursion into the life of a young bloke in Edwardian London, pursuing a life in the steam trade. This love of trains, however, sees him mixed up in murders, romance and burial ground schemes.
The end couple of chapters strike me as being very much in the manner of older style mysteries - there's a real sense of AHA! going on when the lie of the land is revealed, though I won't spoil them. I can't tell if it's intentional or if it's a weakness in Martin's writing, but it seems to work. Reading Fleming these days it's possible to enjoy the action of the story while being tickled by the construction of some parts of it, or the quaint nature of some technologies or methods or narration, and I think the same applies here.
If you're not into trains you could pass this by - but I suspect you'd be missing out. This isn't heavyweight literature, but it seems a lot of love has gone into the creation of Jim Stringer, so I think I'll be checking out the following (six, seven?) books.
Other than the detailed train info - though I'm sure there's a trainspotter somewhere who's picked Martin up on some minute errors - the novel is a brief excursion into the life of a young bloke in Edwardian London, pursuing a life in the steam trade. This love of trains, however, sees him mixed up in murders, romance and burial ground schemes.
The end couple of chapters strike me as being very much in the manner of older style mysteries - there's a real sense of AHA! going on when the lie of the land is revealed, though I won't spoil them. I can't tell if it's intentional or if it's a weakness in Martin's writing, but it seems to work. Reading Fleming these days it's possible to enjoy the action of the story while being tickled by the construction of some parts of it, or the quaint nature of some technologies or methods or narration, and I think the same applies here.
If you're not into trains you could pass this by - but I suspect you'd be missing out. This isn't heavyweight literature, but it seems a lot of love has gone into the creation of Jim Stringer, so I think I'll be checking out the following (six, seven?) books.