If there was an Oscar ceremony for books, then Jess Kidd’s Victorian mystery Things in Jars would surely sweep the board ... Kidd is a writer who’s not afraid of having fun, but that’s not to say that Things in Jars is a frivolous book. For all its humour and colour, and there’s plenty of both, this is a story of serious evil ... Set against such horror – and Kidd does not flinch in serving it up to us – Bridie’s humanity is all the more moving, but it also makes of the novel something timeless, for it’s not just in Victorian England that kindness has the power to prevail over cruelty ... Macabre dealings may be the subject matter of Things in Jars, but tenderness is at the heart of it ... it’s the good that outweighs the bad and, in so doing, reveals Kidd’s range as a writer. Her dialogue is knife-sharp and often very funny. Her descriptions of London are rich and poetic, with pockets of beauty ... For this wonderful portrait of London, for her beautiful writing and even better storytelling, Jess Kidd richly deserves the award of Best Director. And the Oscar for Best Book? Things in Jars, for all the reasons listed above.
... utterly mesmerizing ... Kidd’s imagination — her ability to imagine a world more magical, darker, richer than our own — is a thing of wonder. She rummages through the layers of Victorian society as if through an old steamer trunk, pulling up all variety of treasures, like pythons and heads in hatboxes. It was a relief to leave the present for Kidd’s imaginary past. Such escapism feels necessary right now, a tonic to the toxicity of the story-cycles of our contemporary moment, where information flashes on a screen and disappears, leaving one bereft of the deeply imagined mythologies — the merrows and mermaids of lore — that have, for centuries, sustained us.
Kidd gives the world what is instantly one of fiction’s great spectral double acts ... If the novel has any problem at all it is that the debate over whether a human may also be a fish or whether such a specimen must be a fraud cannot long be sustained ... Kidd’s descriptive prose is similarly animated, unusual, alarming ... features a large cast of gargoyles fit for Dickens to applaud, a caddish villain and an intricate plot narrated through two time schemes in, respectively, the present and past tense. It is not a quick read because of the writing’s ornate intricacy, but it is an astonishingly satisfying one. To borrow the novel’s watery leitmotif, it is immersive, and although it would be telling to reveal whether or not Bridie and Ruby get it together, this reader fell deeply for them both.
Kidd trades modern times for Victorian England, a setting well suited to her charming, chilling blend of fiction and fantasy. There’s a whiff of Dickens and Sherlock Holmes, with a dash of The Night Circus for seasoning. And, true to form, she unleashes a cast of outlandish characters, such as a boxer’s ghost with a mermaid tattoo that swims around his arm ... Victorian London comes to life in Kidd’s writing. You can feel the fog rising from the first page, and later, the formaldehyde ... Kidd has fashioned enjoyable, indelible characters and a plot that keeps readers guessing, smiling and maybe even flinching.
... unique, complex, yet undeniably beautiful. Kidd’s prose is so daring—using stunning imagery and unpredictable, rare language—that I often found myself pausing while reading, taking time to bask in the beauty of a metaphor or pausing to reflect on a rhetorical question. And, like just like the author’s textured prose, Kidd has built a story that is winding, beautiful, and complex ... The plot is dark and gritty, but with an undeniable grain of optimism resting underneath ... succeeds effortlessly on many fronts. Aside from the daring plot and Kidd’s stunning prose, what perhaps struck me most about the books was the unique cast of characters. Bridie herself is a masterclass of a protagonist ... The goofy characters provide a much needed levity from the darker subject matters of the novel—the sweet romance between Bridie and Ruby and the blossoming friendships between the characters not only allow a break from the macabre subject matter, but also illustrate Kidd’s impressive range as a storyteller ... effortlessly toes the line between historical fiction and a darker fantasy world ... this is the genius of Jess Kidd’s work: she has mastered the art of literary balance. Elements of fact, fiction, hope, and despair are abundant in this novel, and each play a different yet significant role ... magic is everywhere, but it somehow never makes the plot feel less real.
Kidd has created a captivating cast of characters and delivers a richly woven tapestry of fantasy, folklore, and history. The atmosphere is thick with myriad unpleasant smells on offer, and readers may find themselves wrinkling their noses, but they will keep turning the pages.
This pacy piece of Victorian crime fiction delivers chills galore ... Kidd’s research is worn lightly, with occasional real names dropped in for orientation...But her imagination rides wild, in tightly controlled prose. Her concision makes the book feel like a high-pressure jar, stuffed with frightening specimens including a knife-wielding rogue surgeon ... That most handed-down of tropes, the mermaid, is refreshed here into a merrow, a magical creature who affects the weather and the emotions of all who look on her. If the book is reminiscent of other successes, this is hardly Kidd’s fault: it was no doubt in gestation before these works appeared. Authors can be sensitive to literary fashions in a profound way, on-trend because they inhale and exhale the cultural mood. But ultimately a lot of this feels familiar, even as it strives to be strange, with its supporting cast of liberated circus performers, choreographed ravens and noisy parrots. Still, it is well worth the price of admission.
Kidd has woven a spellbinding alternate version of Victorian London that is both recognizable and like getting lost in some mist-shrouded parallel world only spoken of in myths. It is into this version of London, where tattooed ghosts lurk near their own gravestones and seven-foot-tall housekeepers spend their idle time reading potboiler fiction, that Kidd drops Bridie Devine, a private detective with such distinctive style and intense charisma that we fall in love with her immediately ... Equal parts historical thriller and fabulist phantasm, Things in Jars is instantly compelling, but what sets it apart is the prose. There’s a playful, lithe familiarity to it as Kidd dances across delightfully apt phrases like a master. Even as the novel sweeps you up in its narrative, it also sweeps you up in its sentence-by-sentence construction, making it both a whirlwind read and a novel you could happily get lost in for weeks, dissecting every paragraph ... the kind of lavish, elegant genre treat that makes you wish Kidd would churn out a new Bridie Devine mystery every three years until the end of time.
Though unfortunately told in the current fad of first-person present, this tale of men seeking a mermaid, that beguiling siren luring sailors to their doom, and finding instead a merrow, a much rarer and more dangerous creature, is at the same time a mystery as well as a horror story ... As intriguing as Bridie’s search for the missing Christabel and the delving into the mystery of her origins is the mystery of her acquaintance with Ruby Doyle and the bittersweet and gentle growing of affection between woman and ghost. It’s as sad a tale as that of any mermaid who falls in love with a human, and there’s no way it can have a happy ending ... In this ancient myth transformed into a frightening Gothic tale, author Jess Kidd has created a winsome but tough heroine in Bridie Devine, whom readers could happily follow through a series.
Kidd’s prose is a river of detail, metaphor, and jarringly apt turns of phrase, bringing to life all too vividly the grotesque maze of human wickedness that Bridie threads ... Fans of the macabre will be mesmerized by this horrific gothic tale, but some may be disturbed by the overt, grisly details.
There’s a lot going on in this singular novel, and none of it pretty ... Kidd is an expert at setting a supernatural mood perfect for ghosts and merrows, but her human villains make them seem mundane by comparison. With so much detail and so many clever, Dickensian characters, readers might petition Kidd to give Bridie her own series ... Creepy, violent, and propulsive; a standout gothic mystery.
... lurid but languid ... Vividly sketched, larger-than-life characters and powerful senses of time and place compensate for the glacial pace and the underdeveloped plot. Penny-dreadful fans will delight in this stylish tale, but readers seeking a satisfying puzzle should look elsewhere.
