The Final Act of Daphne Devine (The Great Deception, 3)

Syd Moore
Magpie, 8 October 2027 
Available as: PB, 352pp, audio, e   
Source: Advance copy
ISBN(PB): 9780861541645

I'm grateful to the publisher for giving me access to an advance e-copy of The Final Act of Daphne Devine to consider for review.

The Final Act of Daphne Devine sees our heroine Daphne face her greatest test yet as she struggles against the evils of Nazism in the Second World War.

Readers of the earlier stories will recall how Daphne was recruited in SOE's - the British clandestine warfare organisation formed by Churchill to "set Europe ablaze" and specifically into section W, focussing on deception and especially, on countering the Reich's use of the occult. Or, on manipulating its belief in the occult. Which is what military deception is: the point isn't to make your enemy believe something, but to make them act in certain ways. Whether or not, in Moore's universes, there is any reality to the supernatural, is kept rather mysterious - though you may find an answer in the fact that this is the same world as that of her Essex Witch mysteries.

Anyway. In The Final Act, Daphne has been smuggled into Germany with the aim of placing a certain book - a certain Grimoire - in the hands of a senior Nazi. She's accompanied by Jack, her former lover, which tightens tension as there are things and experiences they're both carefully not going into. As an agent, their lives are in danger, something Moore underlines in an authorial voice hinting at trials to come. One fears for both, and also for those who are - at great risk - helping them on their mission. Moore's at pains both to expose the utter evil of the Nazi regime but also to point up those with courage who simply will not stand for what's being done.

Moore also, in this instalment of the series as in the previous books, takes what I think is a rather brave and unusual approach to constructing her story and narrating Daphne's experiences. We're used, I think, to secret agent derring-do, to stories with a bit of the James Bond pixie dust where the hero (generally a hero not a heroine) is basically freed of constraints (both operational a moral) and cost a swathe of destruction through their enemies. I think perhaps that freedom is what attracts certain readers. But Moore isn't having that. Rather she shows us just how controlled, how restricted, an agent must be on this kind of mission. You're almost without help or support in foreign territory, how are you going to survive other than by sticking to the plan and accessing what aid has been arranged?

And once cut off from that, facing the risk of capture and death, you absolutely are NOT free to fight a war on your own terms - as Daphne discovers.

In these circumstances it's not racing hell that will save you. it's minute observation, understanding those around you, knowing how to take advantage of the smallest opening, the merest hint of a way through. 

It's the ability to carry on with that Great Deception - something daphne's rather good at, as it happens.

And as her fate bears her on, that's exactly what Miss Devine does, making allies where she can, using enemies where she can,  drawing on what she learned in her stage career, what she's learned as part of Section W, leaving her mourning for losses and betrayals till she can conduct it in safety. Facing stomach-churning danger and terrible reverses, Daphne presses on with her mission, then bends her escape plan to serving some further good purposes, carrying news out of Germany about further heinous crimes that aren't yet widely known. It's epic, exciting stuff - because, not in spite of, the fact that Daphne's choices are often terribly limited.

Along the way, Moore shows us plenty of courage and opposition whether in Germany itself, Belgium or France, showing good-hearted people of all sorts simply doing there best - the most any of us can aspire to.

A gripping read, strongly recommended.

For more information about The Final Act of Daphne Devine, see the publisher's website here.

Review - Ring The Bells by CK McDonnell

Ring the Bells (Stranger Times, 5)

CK McDonnell
Transworld, 15 October 2026
Available as: HB, PB, 496pp, audio, e   
Source: Advance copy
ISBN: HB 9780857505392, PB 9781804993378

Ring The Bells is the 5th book in the Stranger Times series, now out in paperback in time for you to get for a friend who might enjoy a bit of weird Manchester - or your self, to read as the nights draw in. I'm grateful to the publisher for giving me access to an advance e-copy to consider for review. 

You actually might not think of McDonnell's Stranger Times series as providing potential for a Christmassy story. The titular, Manchester based newspaper, which operates from a decaying, closed-down church, and chronicles the eerie and the unexplained is produced on a shoestring by a cabal of eccentrics and misanthropes. Attempts by the staff to inject a note of goodwill or cheer into proceedings tend to fall flat, even if the team general end up saving the world by the last page.

The books so far have tended to explore the seamier side of supernatural life leaving little time for wonder and cheer. Most of all, the editor, Banecroft (who is surely some sort of cousin to Jackson Lamb in Slow Horses) lives on cynicism and booze and would, one thinks, likely sit up by the fireplace with a shotgun ready to scare Father Christmas right back up the chimney.

So, as the storyline here develops, it's fun to imagine how the coalescing evil - which is clearly going to coalesce into something rather Santa-shaped - will both ring all the Christmas bells and threaten the known universe. That does happen, I didn't anticipate how, and the knowledge of it doesn't in any way lessen the fun and the fear when it does. I will say that there were possibly Prathcettian overtones to the theme here that belief in itself is a power to be reckoned with, but McDonnell also plays subtle games with the usual seasonal redemption arc which should make us question the transformation of an evildoer into the Chrismassiest person ever. Here, even the wrongdoer has his doubts about that trope.

A couple of sub-plots are though perhaps worth as much attention as the main story. Christmas is a time for family, and as far as we know, Manny, the mysterious Rastafarian printer who makes sure that each week's edition of the ST gets to its readers, has no family (other than the strange entity which imbues him). In this story, we find out more about Manny's background. It's a very affecting and sad story, giving him a central place he deserves after four books of being rather at the margins (or perhaps, in the basement).

There are also developments in the world of the Founders, the entitled and wealthy clique who try to control the magical world. Given that places at that table tend to follow the "dead man's shoes" rule, it's perhaps no surprise that competition is ruthless but Ring the Bells sets us up I think for a future battle Royale to fill a pair of those shoes (only given the likely contenders, they'd better be killer heels, not just any old shoes.

An entertaining and fun addition to this series, showing the value of an ensemble cast which keeps things fresh by always providing new corners and angles to explore.

For more information about Ring the Bells, see the publisher's website here.