Diana Gabaldon‘s book titled “Lord John and the Hand of Devils”contains three novellas of increasing lengths. I listened to the 9 CD unabridged audio version, where the first was on 2 discs, the second on three and the last on the remaining four. What’s common in them is that they all start as Lord John, an 18th century military man investigating something mysterious and by the end he finds the perfectly reasonable or scientific if you will, causes. Be it a murder of a government official, a succubus haunting an army, or the causes of a cannon explosion, respectively. The writing is engaging and easy to follow, the logic of the essentially detective stories is fun to follow.
But I was not happy with the book for several reasons. I picked this novel for the “historical fiction” section of my 999 challenge as it seemed one of the more popular titles. Unfortunately I think it was popular not for the “historical” but the fiction part. These were fine combination of detective, love and ghost stories. But if you expect to learn something about the historical era the book is set in you will be disappointed. It was essentially just an insignificant backdrop for the action.
Second, I had problems with the CD version. I now know that I should not listen to books on CDs that jump right into the middle of the story with a multitude of characters. It took me quiet some time to figure out what’s going on as it is not as easy to turn back the pages on the CD as it is in the printed book. Furthermore Jeff Woodman gave a superb performance in his rendering of the voices of the various characters. But,again, this versatility was detrimental for my comprehension. Simpler reading, as opposed to performing would have been better for me. YMMV.
A slight warning:my heteronormative reading habits id not prepare me for homosexual sensual/sexual narrative. There is not much of it in the book, but it definitely an essential part.
I haven’t read anything else from Diana Gabaldon, so I didn’t exactly know how this volume fits in her works. At the end of the book she gave an extensive and rather amusing explanation about how this book was born. It provided as enjoyable context for the saga. It is always interesting to learn why a book was born and find out how accidental it might have been.
If you like detective stories and ready to immerse yourself into a mutlivolume saga of 18th century intrigue this book is an easy introduction into Gabaldon’s world. Otherwise you won’t miss much.