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Charles Patterson #1
Broken Harmony
The 18th century - a different world... But theft, blackmail and murder never change...
In Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the 1730's, life is not easy for an impoverished musician. For Charles Patterson, violinist, harpsichord player, composer and would-be church organist, it's about to get a whole lot harder. First he is accused of stealing a valuable book. Then a cherished violin belonging to his flamboyant professional rival Henri le Sac disappears, rapidly followed by le Sac himself. And when the young apprentice he inherited from his rival is gruesomely murdered, Patterson starts to feel out of his depth. Strange goings-on at the elegant home of capricious Lady Anne leave him in fear for his health and sanity, and the lady's cousin, Esther Jerdoun, seems to be trying to warn him about something. The mystery deepens as the death toll mounts, and it becomes clear that things are not quite as they appear.
In Newcastle-upon-Tyne in the 1730's, life is not easy for an impoverished musician. For Charles Patterson, violinist, harpsichord player, composer and would-be church organist, it's about to get a whole lot harder. First he is accused of stealing a valuable book. Then a cherished violin belonging to his flamboyant professional rival Henri le Sac disappears, rapidly followed by le Sac himself. And when the young apprentice he inherited from his rival is gruesomely murdered, Patterson starts to feel out of his depth. Strange goings-on at the elegant home of capricious Lady Anne leave him in fear for his health and sanity, and the lady's cousin, Esther Jerdoun, seems to be trying to warn him about something. The mystery deepens as the death toll mounts, and it becomes clear that things are not quite as they appear.
280 pages, Paperback
First published April 5, 2007
4 people are currently reading
33 people want to read
About the author
Roz Southey
17 books4 followersRoz Southey is a novelist and musicologist living in the north-east of England. She is the author of the Charles Patterson mysteries, a series of detective novels set in Newcastle upon Tyne and published by Creme de la Crime (now an imprint of Severn House); the fifth novel in the series will be published in March 2011. Her short stories have won a number of competitions; one was published in The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime (ed. Maxim Jakubowski, 2009) and another will appear in the 2011 version of the same collection. She has also published non-fiction books and articles, including local and family history, and academic papers.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
May 6, 2019
This is a bit of an oddity, but none the worse for that. It's a mystery set in the 1730s in Newcastle, written by a musicologist, so you can be assured that the occupation of the main characters is going to be convincing. Charles Patterson is a harpsichord player (though he's proficient on other instruments too) who aspires to lead the city's small chamber orchestra, a position he thinks should be his by right. However, Patterson has an arch rival, first violin Henri Le Sac, and it is he who leads - and, as Patterson grudgingly admits, is a virtuoso player, dextrous and showy, to the frequent delight of audiences. Patterson himself, meanwhile, is proficient and an excellent leader, but unexciting. The two men vie for pupils, as well, as teaching provides an important supplementary income, and it only exacerbates their antagonism that each has a friend who is a dancing master. Indeed, if anything, Demsey and Nichols hate each other even more than the two musicians.
The oddity comes with the story's supernatural element. We quickly learn that hauntings are a part of everyday existence - spirits, it seems, usually take a hundred years before they leave the place where death occurred - and I can imagine that some readers will feel uncomfortable with the notion that ghosts, if they can be found, can reveal the identity of their murderers, but there are constraints on the ways this can happen, and anyway, there's something about the 18th-century world which is amenable to the paranormal, perhaps because it gave birth to the gothic. I found that I quickly accepted the spirits almost as part of the period detail - which, not surprisingly, is excellent, since the author's own research area is 18th-century music-making. She evokes Newcastle of the time, a provincial city surrounded by by coalmines, to great effect, persuading me that it's every bit as fascinating as London or Edinburgh.
There's a slightly longer version of this review at http://geraniumcatsbookshelf.blogspot...
The oddity comes with the story's supernatural element. We quickly learn that hauntings are a part of everyday existence - spirits, it seems, usually take a hundred years before they leave the place where death occurred - and I can imagine that some readers will feel uncomfortable with the notion that ghosts, if they can be found, can reveal the identity of their murderers, but there are constraints on the ways this can happen, and anyway, there's something about the 18th-century world which is amenable to the paranormal, perhaps because it gave birth to the gothic. I found that I quickly accepted the spirits almost as part of the period detail - which, not surprisingly, is excellent, since the author's own research area is 18th-century music-making. She evokes Newcastle of the time, a provincial city surrounded by by coalmines, to great effect, persuading me that it's every bit as fascinating as London or Edinburgh.
There's a slightly longer version of this review at http://geraniumcatsbookshelf.blogspot...
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January 28, 2015Very strange little mystery. Takes place in Newcastle, England, sometime in the late 18th century. Our protagonist, Charles Patterson, is a harpsichord/violin/organ player and composer. In this book, his chief rival for director of the "band" of "gentlemen" is a Swiss violinist. He is not a sleuth of any sort, but is forced into the role by a serious of misfortunes that all seem to point to him or his rival as the culprits. (As an aside, the structure of the band is interesting, since in this setting, musicians are considered lower than tradesmen in society, and are therefore not ranked among the titled. However, the gentlemen of the area indulge themselves in performing in the band, and taking lessons from the various musicians in town. Thus is a member of the band, yet not in the same class as the majority of them.)
The story outlined above is the "normal" part of the book. Where things get strange is that in this particular setting, the spirits of people who have died are still present. Patterson lives in a boarding house run by a spirit, because no heirs have yet come forward. The spirits are well known, and interact as every other character; the author makes no effort to turn this into a supernatural thriller. In fact, I had trouble remembering sometimes which characters were the ghosts.
The final little oddity of the book is the shift into an alternate world that Patterson occasionally encounters in the vicinity of a particular house in town. I can't go into much detail here to avoid spoilers, but in this other world, he finds that he is far more successful than in his own.
The perpetrator does seem fairly obvious, but the motives are not.
The novel takes some getting used to (what with the spirits and all), but overall I did find it enjoyable. What was particularly of interest to me was the way the chapter headings use music to describe the events of the chapter. That was a particularly fun little play with music and language.
The story outlined above is the "normal" part of the book. Where things get strange is that in this particular setting, the spirits of people who have died are still present. Patterson lives in a boarding house run by a spirit, because no heirs have yet come forward. The spirits are well known, and interact as every other character; the author makes no effort to turn this into a supernatural thriller. In fact, I had trouble remembering sometimes which characters were the ghosts.
The final little oddity of the book is the shift into an alternate world that Patterson occasionally encounters in the vicinity of a particular house in town. I can't go into much detail here to avoid spoilers, but in this other world, he finds that he is far more successful than in his own.
The perpetrator does seem fairly obvious, but the motives are not.
The novel takes some getting used to (what with the spirits and all), but overall I did find it enjoyable. What was particularly of interest to me was the way the chapter headings use music to describe the events of the chapter. That was a particularly fun little play with music and language.
April 2, 2017
This was something I picked up on paperbackswap, on a whim, knowing nothing about the author or the book beyond the description and a rather attractive cover. And then it sat around for a while. Last year, though, I had time on my hands, and I made an effort to pick up those books that had sat around, and so there we were.
It is very quickly very clear that while this is 1730's Newcastle-upon-Tyne, it isn't the 1730's Newcastle-upon-Tyne that existed in this world. Ghosts are everywhere – not Ghosthunters' kind of ghosts, rare spirits seen only by the few, the proud, the deluded - but nearly everyone who's died, and seen by everyone. That took some getting used to, especially since it's presented as a matter of course in the narration, with no background or explanation, as though the reader lived in that alternate universe. In the end, I see the point; there are places where that universe intersects with this, and crossing between is possible. But for about two-thirds of the book this fact was obscure at best, and a hand up would have been nice.
That being said, the writing is lovely and the plot is original and interesting (which is a damning-with-faint-praise sort of word, but I don't mean it that way). Turns out there are six books in the series – and now, knowing the ropes a bit, I expect to enjoy the rest even more.
It is very quickly very clear that while this is 1730's Newcastle-upon-Tyne, it isn't the 1730's Newcastle-upon-Tyne that existed in this world. Ghosts are everywhere – not Ghosthunters' kind of ghosts, rare spirits seen only by the few, the proud, the deluded - but nearly everyone who's died, and seen by everyone. That took some getting used to, especially since it's presented as a matter of course in the narration, with no background or explanation, as though the reader lived in that alternate universe. In the end, I see the point; there are places where that universe intersects with this, and crossing between is possible. But for about two-thirds of the book this fact was obscure at best, and a hand up would have been nice.
That being said, the writing is lovely and the plot is original and interesting (which is a damning-with-faint-praise sort of word, but I don't mean it that way). Turns out there are six books in the series – and now, knowing the ropes a bit, I expect to enjoy the rest even more.
August 23, 2015
I have read this and the other books in the series several times and hope that Roz Southey will soon publish a new volume. I spent some 8 months in Durham on research for my PHD thesis and visited Newcastle several times as well as other towns mentioned in the volumes. So it has been fun to go back to the first half of the 1700's. Upon first beginning this book I was disconcerted, not realizing that Southey has created an alternate Newcastle with spirits, while the Newcastle that Charles Patterson visits is that of our universe. So there are at least 2 parallel universes, s situation in agreement with some current theories of physics. Southey has thought about how spirits can affect the plot and frankly it is a very interesting to see how they affect plot. Patterson is an engaging character, relating each mystery in the first person, and how he manages the class distinctions, which were strict, is engaging. Hester Jerdoun and Hugh and Heron are all interesting characters; I hope Heron's background is fleshed out a bit as in subsequent volumes he becomes a main character. Esther is drawn in a realistic way for a woman that is willing to go against convention and yet maintain her social position--no mean situation to negotiate. Highly recommended alternate universe fiction!
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April 8, 2015Well - I finished the book and - avoiding spoilers here - let me amend my mid-reading critique by saying that in the end I feel the author did pull together the various sci-fi/fantasy + mystery elements in a satisfying way that was not an arbitrary throwing together of the elements. It does make the book an odd blend of genres but I suppose that's nothing very unusual these days.
With the author's background in historical musicology I would be interested in checking out the later books in the series to see if we learn more about music-making in this fascinating period of English history.
With the author's background in historical musicology I would be interested in checking out the later books in the series to see if we learn more about music-making in this fascinating period of English history.
March 5, 2015
For me the alternative 17th century Newcastle upon Tyne, where spirits linger on after their death, appealed to me so much that I've read all the Charles Patterson books so far.
Throughout the series, the descriptions draw you in, bring a bygone era to life. Believable enough to immerse yourself in a 17th century musician's world, and yet - different.
The series is a feel-good, entertaining read. I look forward to reading more about the cast around Charles Patterson.
Throughout the series, the descriptions draw you in, bring a bygone era to life. Believable enough to immerse yourself in a 17th century musician's world, and yet - different.
The series is a feel-good, entertaining read. I look forward to reading more about the cast around Charles Patterson.
September 5, 2009
Another disappointment. I didn’t dislike the character and most of the 1735 setting, but the spirits and the woo-woo travelling between worlds were just dumb. The explanation of how the villain managed to live in both worlds was unsatisfactory to say the least. Bah.
April 17, 2015
An odd combo of historical mystery and fantasy. I struggled to keep the characters straight, though I'm not sure if that's my fault or the author's. I wasn't hugely drawn to the book, only getting really interested in the last 20%, but I might read further in the series.
January 4, 2015
18th century job musician in Newcastle. Clever setting.
January 20, 2015
Well written but not my genre! Time travel & conversations with spirits of dead people involved. Interesting historical fiction none the less.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews