Yes I get it he's smart and he knows stuff but he's also an unbearable supercilious ass, so much so that I really didn't understand at the end that the heroine stayed anywhere near him. And she was way too innocent for her back story.  

The story is set in 1882 and March Middleton comes to the door of Sidney Grice's house to stay there as his ward (now yes, she has to stay until she's of age but I then started the series that follows this and she's still in that house having stayed there). When she was a little younger she was with her father in India and there are suggestions that a love affair went horribly wrong (the temptation to capitalise the H and W there were great).  She's smart but Sidney is smarter and he never explains himself or tells people why his conclusions are right, which puts March in danger more than once.  The crime is twisty and messy and the outcome features some deus ex machina.  I was left feeling unsatisfied and wanting more.

I bought this at a library sale because the cover caught my eye; I had no expectations, as I'd never heard of it before but it had a vaguely Holmesian feel to it.

I wasn't wrong; there are both subtle and blatant nods to Doyle and Holmes throughout the story, but... I don't know how to say this.  The Mangle Street Murders reads like it was written by someone well-versed in the Holmes cannon but who resented the varnish put on the Victorian age and so set out to reimagine a Holmes worthy murder mystery in all its gory, gritty detail.

If that's indeed what Kasasian set out to do, then boy howdy did he/she succeed.  Sydney Grice, the famous personal detective is what Holmes might look like if he were actually a sociopath.  Self admittedly greedy, vain, selfish and without a shred of courtesy or decency he's almost a comic figure, until the reader is forced to witness his delight in public executions and other examples of his inhumanity.  The author tries half-heartedly to hint at some underlying decency, but frankly fails; they are too few and too brief to have any impact.  Add to that the grisly, graphic details in just about every scene of the book and it's a wonder I kept reading past the first mortuary scene.  There were times I honestly felt like the author was trying to punish the reader, beating them over the head with the reality of the 1880's.

But I did keep reading; I really liked the MC, March Middleton.  From the introduction it's clear she's Grice's historian, in much the same way Watson was for Holmes, only she is (sorry Watson, I love you) much smarter than Watson and a far more invested participant. Of course she has a hidden pain - a tragedy in her past - that is shared piecemeal in the form of old journal entries.  These are done perfectly: just often enough that they tug at your soul and keep you on the edge of your seat dreading what must be the inevitable.  The inevitable, however, must be part of a multi book story arc because we don't get to it here.

The plotting was competent.  Of course Grice is secretive so neither Marsh nor the reader are every privy to crucial details until very nearly the end when he waves his superiority around in a nauseating way, but Marsh gets hers back, making for a more even read.  The ultimate criminal was a person I pegged very early in the book, but there were so many layers and complexities that really all I'd done was identify the tip of the iceberg.

All said, the writing is excellent, the story and characters were compelling and I definitely won't read the second one.  I'm not at all ashamed to admit that I don't want this level of factual realism in my books.  I enjoyed the mystery but it was overshadowed by the author's need for verisimilitude; if you don't mind that level of grittiness, and you enjoy a good historical mystery, then this one is worth exploring.  Otherwise stick with Holmes and Watson.

A self-obsessed, aloof, personal detective who occasionally wears an eye patch and lives in the heart of London at the end of the 19th century. A young woman with surgical experience and a determination to be treated the same as a man. A bloody murder with an obvious suspect who acts as if he's completely innocent. Where can you find all of these things in the same place? In The Mangle Street Murders by M.R.C. Kasasian. This is the first book in the Gower Street Detective series and it really sets the scene for the kind of rude, sarcastic sleuthing that would have amused Arthur Conan Doyle to no end. This book often parodies Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories (there's even mention of the author himself) as well as the mystery genre in general. Sidney Grice is not a nice man. I didn't find him to be a likeable character in the slightest. His motivation for solving crimes is made somewhat less honorable by his greediness and priggishness. His ward, March Middleton, is somewhat of a caricature of what it means to be a feminist from the 19th century. She is continuously frustrated with Grice's narcissism in regards to the central case of this novel. The prime suspect displays all the indications of innocence while Grice refuses to budge from his position that the suspect is guilty. If you can't handle descriptions of gore then you might find certain passages of The Mangle Street Murders quite difficult to read. However, if you think the idea of a fussy detective who treats everyone with as little consideration as he can get away with sounds like a good time then this is the book for you. I plan on continuing this series (at least through the second book) so I guess we'll find out together what kind of trouble Grice will find himself in next. For this one, I give it an 8/10.

One of the dangers of becoming an established genre is that it makes parody possible. All anyone has to do is exaggerate the genre's characteristics a little more and bam! Comedy. I'm sure parody is a stage in the life cycle of a genre on some chart somewhere. M.R.C. Kasasian's The Mangle Street Murders, the first in the Gower Detective series, is one of the best parodies of the detective genre that I've read in a long time...

Read the rest of my review at Summer Reading Project.

3.5 of 5 stars

When March Middleton's father dies she finds that she cannot maintain the family home. On deciding to let it she moves from Lancashire to move in with her new Guardian, Sidney Grice, an old friend of her father.

Sidney Grice however is no ordinary man. He is the famous personal detective, employed by the great and good to investigate a variety of crimes.

March soon finds herself drawn into one of Sidney's investigations when a woman appears at his door, begging him to investigate her daughter's death.

I had bought this book and left it sat on my Kindle for a while so I was pleased to finally get to read it. I enjoyed this first adventure of The Gower Street Detective series very much. It is a fun, light-hearted read set in Victorian London. A London full of misogyny, grime and crime and one which the feisty March is more than equipped to deal with. I loved her responses to the negativity directed at her for her looks, or lack thereof, and the fact that she is a woman. She gives as good as she gets, and often as a result gains respect.

Sidney Grice is a detestable little man, conceited, contriving and critical of anyone other than himself. He is however a caricature and because of all of these characteristics a great character to read. There are a host of other lovely characters including the put upon but not downtrodden maid Molly and Inspector Pound, whose interest in March is hinted at throughout. There is also a secret in March's past that is a main part of the story and isn't concluded, leaving it open to run throughout the series.

Whilst I worked out the mystery from about half way through the book this didn't stop my enjoyment. It was a quick read, with lots of short chapters that helped me race through it. Luckily the next in the series The Curse of the House of Foskett was in my to read pile so I began to read that straight after this one. I'm already looking forward to book three!