The Boy with Five Names
It will aid the reader to have previous acquaintance with courtesan-turned-coffee shop owner Polly Paradice; her lover, French Huguenot painter André Dark; and her lively maid, Gin. Polly’s actress sister Mattie, central to the plot of books 2 and 3 in the series, also strolls in here. This fourth volume centers around Polly’s business partner, Hannah Evans, whose new motherhood to infant Rose spurs her wish to discover the fate of her son, Kojo, who was separated from her by Hannah’s former enslaver. As the friends team up to locate him, Dark also hopes to recover another enslaved boy he once painted, whose mistress had named him Pompey. Belle is adept at bringing historical detail to breathing life, and this tale spotlights the extensive Black population of London, enslaved persons and free. She skirts the white savior complex by giving Hannah agency and advancing the search through other Black characters, including the hulking Septimius Severus, tapped into the London underworld, and the elegant Lady Lucinda, who enjoys another identity as the equally elegant Luke Bradley.
As always, setting is a strength of this series, as when Belle describes central London “with crumbling old houses that had avoided the Fire and were now decaying back into their constituent parts.” Traversing the bustling city is one of the book’s many rewards as characters search through Covent Garden, Shadwell, Mile End, West Ham, and the East India docks. With a large cast of old friends to involve in the quest, there is little time for character development, but the voice of young Kojo reflecting now and again on the turns of his life suffices for an emotional arc. The calico riots of 1719 also factor into the plot, adding adventure and intrigue to a story rich with the rewards of friendship and found family.
