REVIEWED BY TINA KARELSON:         


PHILIP PULLMAN The Ruby in the Smoke

PHILIP PULLMAN – The Ruby in the Smoke: A Sally Lockhart Mystery. Oxford University Press, hardcover, 1985. Reprinted many times, in both hardcover and soft. TV movie: BBC, 2006 (with Billie Piper as Sally).

   First published in the U.K. in 1985, this was published in the U.S. in 2008, after the success of Pullman’s “His Dark Materials” trilogy. It’s more of an adventure story taking place in London, 1852, than a mystery, in the vein of the penny dreadfuls that the character Jim devours.

   In this first book in the series, 16-year-old Sally receives a mysterious note related to the death of her father, a shipping agent who drowned in the South China Sea. As she begins to investigate the note, Sally tumbles headlong into a mystery involving opium, pirates, Chinese secret societies, the seamiest areas of Victorian London, a legendary ruby and the truth about her own identity.

   It’s a quick read, awash in Pullman’s wonderful writing. Here’s the sailor Bedwell describing how the sea looked the night Sally’s father died:

PHILIP PULLMAN The Ruby in the Smoke

    “Our wake and our bowwave were great swirling tracks made up of billions of spots of white light, and all the sea on both sides was full of deep glowing movements — fishes darting through the depths, great shimmering clouds and veils of shadowy color, little surges and whirlpools of light far below — once or twice in your life you get a night like that, and it’s a sight to leave you breathless.”

   Recommended for craft and atmosphere.

    Bibliographic Data:

       The Sally Lockhart series —

    1. The Ruby in the Smoke (1985)
    2. The Shadow in the Plate (1986) aka The Shadow in the North (US)
    3. The Tiger in the Well (1990)
    4. The Tin Princess (1994)