If a Gothic tale needs one thing to make it a truly Gothic tale, it needs an antagonist in the grip of a profound monomania. Obsessions and obsessional manias are among of the principle building blocks of gothic literature. Be those obsessions with an individual, an object, a grand desire, or the impossible. Obsessions and often guilt.

Take Bernice, Poe’s the most gothic of his early stories, it centres around a man obsessed with the perfect teeth of his dying wife. Obsessed to the extent he must have them so breaks into her coffin after she is buried to remove them each with some basic dentistry. That he discovers she is not actually dead despite been buried doesn’t stop him. His obsession all consuming and placing him beyond reason. It is only to the end of the tale as he realises what he has done that the guilt drives him over the precipice.

Shelly’s Doctor Frankenstein is obsessed with creating life. Renfield’s madness in Dracula. Doctor Jekyll and his alter-ego. Absolutely everyone one way or another in A Picture of Dorien Grey. Heathcliff in Wuthering Heights… Me and my obsession with trying to get everyone to read Wuthering Heights…

It also does modern gothic writers no harm at all to do their reading on such things, a tad obsessively… A little madness is a good thing. As is spending some time in the fictions of the 19th century in general I find, if you can survive the archaic nature of the writing at times. But if you want to write interesting, involving, and great modern Gothic fiction, while knowing the roots of the genre is import, being willing to grow from those roots and sprout in strange directions is just as important. Which brings me neatly to Jack the Re-animator By Jessica Law. A book I only discovered existed when Jessica wrote a blog post for me a couple of weeks ago. The one about snail telepathy…

Jack the Re-animator is a delightfully gothic tale set, given the many cultural references within the novel, in the last decade of the 19th century. It’s intricacies of plot, with multiple threads, multitude of characters, and occasionally sinister overtones make for an enthralling read. It has all the drama, complexity and darkness of classic gothic literature, yet a cast of ‘modern’ characters that feel realistic to our modern sensibilities.

Issac, the junior detective is tasked (in mysterious fashion) with discovering why some dead people are not staying dead the traditional, and far more legally convenient fashion, but instead turning up and wanting their old lives back. A threat most dire to the realm.

You spend a fortune on probate lawyers, funerals, ordering a wardrobes worth of morning black, read the will, divide everything up, and everyone has a good weep by the grave side, then the blaggard turns up right as nine-pence, no longer suffering form the goat that killed him… It really is insufferable…

Then to add insult to injury the grave robbers supplying ‘Jack’ the re-animator, dig up a recently executed serial killer and don’t bother to mention this detail of the corpses providence to the monomaniacal re-animator of the dead. A serial killer who was caught originally caught by Issac (which is how he became a junior detective, despite the societal hindered of having a father who was ‘of the commonwealth’ as his inspector would put it…)

Luckily for Issac he has some help in the form of Adeline Earnshaw a former nurse and medium who was ostracised by her wealthy family for neither of these things but rather for having a sapphic outlook. Adeline is also formally alive, as she is one of Jack’s ‘victims’ having been returned to life after her successful suicide.

Unfortunately Adeline remembers everything about the painful process of being returned to life, except who Jack is, and how to find him. Something she shares with his other victims.

Just want is ‘Jack’ as they have christened him, re-animating people for? Do the resurrection men hold the key? Who else is formerly dead? And when with the Angel-maker strike again?

Its a witty fast moving read, that’s a little mad in places, but a little madness is always required, it is a little gothic masterpiece. More of this please…

<<<<< slight spoilers ahead>>>>>>

Jack is not really called jack. It is just a name given to him by the detectives. Jack is an interesting character in his own right and another novel telling his perspective would have been just as, if not more, interesting. Though more darkly psychological and monomania based… Jack as a character is not alone either. There are several of Jessica’s characters here could make make for fascinating novels all on their own. She has a talent for portraying darkness and those on the edge of things with a tone and feeling that draws them upon you. None of her character are as straight-forward as they seem.

The plot is far from simple either, it isn’t so opaque that you don’t see things coming, in the little clues scattered here and there, if you pay attention, but not so transparent as to make it unsatisfying to discover you had figured right about this thing, or that thing and there will be clue that escape you until after the reveal. There is a lot of care and a lot of craft to this story.

Its a great read, and I only have one real complain about it,that being that it is only available in ebook. Cnsidering even the utter garbage that is The Drag King in Yellow (note. I can say this, you can’t) is available in paperback, and this isn’t , it strikes me the universe lacks balance..

That said, however, it being Jessica law while there is no paperback there is a song of the same name that is drawn directly from the novel, which includes a short reading from the book and as well as mentioning character from the novel. Like all of Jessica’s music it is fabulous…

Luckily for everyone, I have no intent on write and performing songs based on my own novels , I will leave that to Jessica…