By Andy Charman
Published by Unbound https://unbound.com/
320 pages ISBN 9781800180901
Publication date 21 January 2021
I was sent a paperback copy to enable me to take part in this Blog Tour. I would like to than Anne at Random Things Tours for the invitation to participate and of course the Author and publishers.
Unbound is the world’s first crowdfunding publisher, established in 2011. The publication of Crow Court was made possible thanks to individuals pledging their support, a list of whom is included on pages 321-323.
From the blurb
Spring, 1840. In the Dorset market town of Wimborne Minster, a young choirboy drowns himself. Soon after, the choirmaster-a belligerent man with a vicious reputation-is found murdered, in a discovery tainted as much by relief as it is by suspicion. The gaze of the magistrates falls on four local men, whose decisions will reverberate through the community for years to come.
Synopsis
It becomes apparent that the choirmaster in the Dorset market town of Wimborne Minster is harsh, unpleasant and ungodly man. He is Matthew Ellis who known amongst the choirboys as ‘Buggermaster’ and someone to be avoided. When a disturbed young choirboy drowns himself following abuse at his hands some of the locals decide something must be done. When four local men decide to confront him, he is found with knife wounds to his abdomen and they immediately fall under suspicion for his murder, though it isn’t clear what happened.
Then covering a time span of twenty-three years and through a series of fourteen interwoven tales the continuation of life in Wimborne Minister is laid out. All through that time the events of spring 1840 are not forgotten and the fear that justice will be metered out.
My thoughts
This cleverly constructed novel isn’t so much a whodunnit as a who-didn’t-do-it. The plot revolves around the apparent murder of the choirmaster and that incident produces tendrils twisting in and out of a series of stories which then follow. These stories convey the impact of the murder over the coming years and how it effects the lives of those loosely connected to it. From the Crow Court itself onwards the crow makes symbolic reappearances as the harbinger of death and misfortune.
The writing style is sympathetic with the period, avoiding modernisms and without introducing arcane language, but the prose doesn’t suffer by becoming too dense. The introduction of Dorset dialect works well, it being used by the characters one would expect to be speaking it with the more refined classes avoiding it. For me this helps to lift the dialogue, breaking up the rhythm or metering, in the absences of incident or action. It is skilfully used rather than randomly employed and while I’m sure many readers will be able to read and comprehend it with little trouble there is a helpful glossary of terms at the back.
Mid eighteenth-century rural life is lovingly described, and the characters sympathetically portrayed, especially those lower down the social order. The stories which feature Art and Jane Pugh are captivating, Art the simple man of hard graft and Jane a woman who must learn the secrets of nature to eke out their existence. In another time she may have been regarded as a witch, but here she is able to befriend and pass on her knowledge to Evelyn. The author clearly has affection for the county of his birth, its people and their shared history.
It’s not all country idyll though as we see the plight of the farm labourers as the face grinding poverty becoming itinerant workers just to survive. Some resort to burning threshing machines, as mechanisation makes workers redundant, a crime that could lead to transportation to Australia. These were still brutal days for many people, and we get reminders throughout of this, be it the threat of the Workhouse, life at sea or the plundering of empire.
The fourteen stories themselves vary both in length and content. Naturally some will appeal to the reader more than others. My favourite was The Smuggler’s Trick in which Charles Ellis, the half half-brother of the dead choirmaster, pits his wits against the local Customs man Domoney to land contraband goods. This is quite a light-hearted piece where Charles comes over as a Victorian Arthur Daley and then produces sleight of hand illusion worthy of David Copperfield. All bluff and double bluff, making the Customs men look fools and repeatedly deliberately mispronouncing the name Domoney as Do-Money just to wind him up. There are sprinklings of humour and choice expressions throughout and Art’s Last Laugh, the shortest story, which is both funny and poignant.
Questions of morality arise throughout the novel and characters face difficult life choices. Murder someone to save a child from being abused but possibly face the gallows? Confess to a murder you didn’t commit because you are dying in the hope of saving your friend? Exhume your wife’s grave because you fear there may be another body in there?
The great change of the period is also reflected with industrialisation and mechanisation, changing attitudes and in the final story the conflict of science and religion. Dorset is the birthplace of palaeontology and so it is fitting that the final story has the reverend Giles going fossil hunting with his nephew Felix and contemplating what the bible says compared with what Charles Darwin has just published.
This is a very enjoyable and accessible historical novel which will appeal to casual readers as well as the hard core historical novel fan. The writing is a delight, the plot construction unusual and the love for Dorset and its people shine through every story.
The author
Andy Charman was born in Dorset and grew up near Wimborne Minster, where Crow Court is set. His short stories have appeared in various
anthologies and magazines, including Pangea and Cadenza. Crow Court is his first novel, which he worked on at the Arvon course at The Hurst in
Shropshire in 2018. Andy lives in Surrey and is available for interview, comment and events.
The e-book version can be purchased from Unbound here
Peter turns the page 