The Lawrence Browne Affair

The Lawrence Browne Affair (2017) Cat Sebastian (The Turner Series)

Set in England in 1816

Lawrence Browne is waiting to go mad.

In the meantime, he’s trying to be useful, putting his efforts into various inventions, but refusing to let anyone get close to him, for fear of taking them down with him.

Penkellis was no place for a child, madmen were not fit guardians, and nobody knew those facts better than Lawrence himself, who had been raised under precisely those conditions.

Georgie needs to get out of London. He’s pissed off the gangster he works with and at this point it’s prison or a knife in the back. So when he’s brother’s lover needs someone to head out to check on Radnor, Georgie figures he can pretend to be a secretary for awhile.

It was satisfying, too, to create order out of utter chaos. It was like untangling a thread or picking a lock.

The story is also a look at dealing with anxiety–when no one knew what anxiety was.

Lawrence had learned years ago that when he felt the creeping unease that signaled what he had come to think of as an attack of madness, he could sometimes set his mind to rights by exhausting himself.

Another thing I particularly like is that Simon reads like an actual kid. There are some authors I love who are completely incapable of writing a child that is not both too old–and too young–for their years.

Publisher: Avon Impulse

Rating: 8/10

• Browse the archives:
  
• Carpe Jugulum » »
• « « American Dreamer