Sweeney Todd: The String of Pearls

by James Malcolm Rymer

Venture into Fleet Street and discover the dark side of Victorian London where you'll encounter the demon barber Sweeney Todd and his menacing accomplice Mrs Lovett in this classic thriller.

Gruesome mysteries are uncovered when Lieutenant Thornhill goes missing after entering Todd's barber shop for a haircut. Londoners are disappearing, Todd's young apprentice Tobias is subject to constant fear and abuse, and the barber's grows more peculiar as the days go by. Menace and murder abounds in this terrifying tale where criminals hide in plain sight and threaten to harm anyone who could get in the way of their schemes.

Famously adapted to the big screen by Tim Burton, Sweeney Todd is a classic of British horror writing and its legendary villain remains iconic this day.

Genres: Classics, Historical Fiction, Horror

304 pages, Paperback

Published July 1, 2024

About the author

James Malcolm Rymer was a British nineteenth century writer of penny dreadfuls, and is the probable author of Varney the Vampire, often attributed to fellow writer Thomas Peckett Prest, and co-author (with Prest) of The String of Pearls, in which the notorious villain Sweeney Todd makes his literary debut.

Information about Rymer is sketchy. In the London Directory for 1841 he is listed as a civil engineer, living at 42 Burton Street, and the British Museum catalogue mentions him in 1842 as editing the Queen's Magazine. Between 1842 to the 1867 he wrote up to 115 popular novels for the English bookseller and publisher, Edward Lloyd, including the best-sellers Ada the Betrayed, Varney the Vampyre and The String of Pearls. Rymer's novels appeared in England under his own name as well as anagrammatic pseudonyms such as Malcolm J. Errym and Malcolm J. Merry.

He died on 11 August 1884 and is buried in Kensal Green cemetery, west London.

Reviews

[Jessica Kellar · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm a fan of the Sweeney Todd musical movie with Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham-Carter so it was interesting to note the differences between the two stories. I enjoyed this book but also found it difficult to read at times due to the language used. If this book were written with modern language it would be half the amount of pages. Overall, a great story though that I enjoyed.

[Jill Rebryna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lucky Victorians. Get to read all these chapters as a serial and have no clue of the truth until next week or the week after that or the week after that. Boo. It would be so fun!!!

[Toby · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm not saying the book was bad when I rate it 2 stars, I just didn't finish it because I didn't understand anything that was going on most of the time because the way that it's written, in ye old language from like over 100 years ago, I can't understand.

I mainly only skipped to the parts with Sweeney Todd in them and then eventually didn't even read everything with him and then just didn't finish it.

The parts that I did read and vaguely understood weren't bad and I did kind of enjoy reading them, but overall it was just too confusing for me and taking me too long to read.

Maybe eventually I'll try and read it again when I think I can comprehend it better, but for now I'll just leave it

[Virginia Henderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars, rounded up to 4.

I watched the 2007 movie for the first time last year (my first introduction to the story) and after I found out there was a book-I'm a sucker for book-to-movie-adaptations-I added it to my TBR. I figured it would be a long time coming to finally read the book, so imagine my surprise when only a month or so later, I run across a copy at HPB!

My overall thoughts- while this was not gruesome or descriptive with the murder scenes like it could have been, this was still quite disturbing, dark, and twisted. Sweeney Todd is a devilishly sinister villain who would sooner turn on you than offer a kind word. Just pure wicked. All of his victims (alive and dead, whether directly or indirectly affected) have nothing but my sympathy.

Several random plot lines along the way made the story run longer than it honestly should have, and the ending was settled WAY too abruptly for my liking. After so much waiting for justice, I would have liked to let the conclusion simmer a bit longer so I could have enjoyed it a bit more.

Content warnings: Lot of death but no blood/gore is described. Violence and abuse, including those beatings, whippings, and torture in a mad house. Cannibalism in the form of "meat" pies. Very mild language. No smut.

The fact that back in the 1840's as a weekly series (Penny Dreadfuls) and people go to read one chapter at a time with no knowledge of what was happening...I can just imagine the shock!

[Emma Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

The 2007 Sweeney Todd film is one of my all time favourite horror movies, and so I was very excited to learn it was a book! For that reason, the book was very different to what I expected. I think the plot was quite thrilling, but with so many different points of perspective things seemed to move very slowly at times. Given the fact that it was initially released in little snippets, I think that many readers would’ve likely become impatient by the slow pace. Overall, I like the plot of the movie slightly better, only because I enjoyed there being a clear motive behind his darkness. But credit has to be given to the author who brought Sweeney Todd to life in the first place.

[Ali · Rating 3 out of 5]

absolutely nothing like what the description was 😟 not enough murder we didn’t know the 2 murderers knew each other until the last 20 pages, the ending was rushed. A lot of unnecessary and unfulfilled plot lines/story’s

[Kiera McCarthy · Rating 2 out of 5]

tbh just not what i expected it to be at all. i thought it would be a lot like. scarier?? more horror or thriller?? rather than just not knowing whats going on the entire time while things just keep happening idk

[Tea · Rating 2 out of 5]

you guys don't want to know where he puts that string of pearls

[Colin Blakley · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was definitely a pulpy book. It was a fun enough read.