It's the year 1634 and an Indiaman sailing ship chartered under the East India Trading Company is about to leave Batavia for Amsterdam with an abundance of passengers carrying their own secrets aboard that threaten the safety of everyone more than the perilous route. The mysterious devil Old Tom lurks aboard instilling fear in everyone's hearts. And the one person everyone believes could solve the mystery is locked up in the darkest corners of the ship travelling to a trial for a crime unknown. The Devil and the Dark Water is a true page-turner, every chapter and every page unlocking the answers to one mystery while creating ten more, unsolvable until the very end.
The novel is told mainly from the perspectives of two characters - Arent Hayes, the friend and bodyguard of Samuel Pipps (the aforementioned prisoner) and Sara Wessel, one of the most important nobles onboard being the wife of the governor-general. Arent's character is shown to be loyal and protective of those he cares about from the start as he has no obligation to be on this voyage but would not leave Pipps and refuses to believe he is guilty of whatever charge it is. The opening chapter immediately shows us what their dynamic is with Arent bearing the brunt of stones being hurled in Pipps' direction, acting as a shield. Sara Wessel is introduced as a woman ahead of her time, with intelligence and a skillset not many women would have been allowed to use in the 17th century without being accused of witchcraft at some time in their lives. She is empathetic and pushes against the limits of her station regardless of the consequences she may face. Arent and Sara are two genuinely good people who are inexplicably tied to bad people but it is their experiences and knowledge that lead them to every corner of the ship and its crews' lives to solve the question of how to lift the curse of Old Tom from the ship.
When a book goes beyond the average 300-400 page length, there has to be something substantial in there to keep a reader interested and this book is full of that. It's very well-paced and at no point is there a large info dump or a lack thereof. With every chapter, you get more reveals about a character's past or something that ties to the present problem or a little bit of both. Each chapter varies in length depending on the content, some of my favourite ones being those that describe the atmosphere and mood of the ship, those on board and the sea itself - those moments when you get a brief shot of every significant character and how they're reacting to the situation around them.
The mystery itself was one I could not unpick no matter how much I tried which made it a joy to find out the next detail I might have missed or was not yet visible. It was brilliantly constructed in a way that though I wanted to flick through the pages just to get a hint of what was to come, I enjoyed not knowing what was to come. Turton also did not introduce the plot and mystery from the start, it was a smart move to start with introducing the setting, the key characters that were involved and having the ship set sail before anything really started. When the Mark of Old Tom appears on the sails and the narration takes you through various characters' reactions, it's like a clock has just started counting down the days or hours until some sort of catastrophe. It's the point in the book that says "you know where you are, now here's what you're going to face". And it doesn't happen too early or too late, rather just on time.
Considering the fact that the book is set in the 17th century, I was pleasantly surprised that there weren't too many references to or accusations of witchcraft whenever the Mark of Old Tom appeared. When it comes to devils in historic fiction, it's easy to throw in accusations of witchcraft on a female character as part of the story but the only one of those is in the past of just one very innocent passenger. Instead, there is more of a focus on finding out which man on the ship is most likely to benefit from summoning a devil like Old Tom for favours promising power.
Reasons to Recommend:
- Mystery historical fiction
- What you would get if you put Sherlock Holmes and Pirates of the Caribbean together
- A who-dunnit story on an isolated vessel with a limited number of suspects
- A HUGE twist at the end that you'd never see coming but makes complete sense
- An amicable solution that is quite devious but for good reasons
- Supernatural entities instilling religious fear debunked
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