The Campbell Curse (D.S.Billings Victorian Mysteries)
In 1892, Detective Sergeant John Billings from Scotland Yard, a secret morphine addict and closet homosexual, is assigned to guard American actress Carola LeFevre, who receives a death threat while performing Macbeth on stage in London. When Billings meets Miss LeFevre, she is accompanied by her nine-year-old daughter, Kitty, a lonely, neglected child, which makes it all the more tragic when she is the victim of a horrible crime.
Meanwhile, a parallel story is told through the diary of Gordon Campbell. His father was a victim of the Campbell Curse. Gordon’s mother is convinced that the curse is upon Gordon when he begins to have the same symptoms his father had. Gordon does not believe this and tries to live a normal life. He has a girlfriend with a daughter named Moira, about the same age as Kitty.
As Billings and his associates hunt down the perpetrator of the crime against Kitty, they have several false leads until a clairvoyant woman gives them a name as a clue. In the search for answers, the detectives meet inhabitants of the London underworld whose names are amusingly Dickensian. Using the information gathered from these characters, Billings connects the clues and the criminal is found.
I enjoyed the twists and turns of this story as well as the red herrings, required in any good crime story. The connection of the two families is obscure and the reader should pay attention to the smallest bit of history. But in the end, it makes sense that both these families would be touched by the Campbell Curse.
