A Glimpse of Heaven #1
Summary:The year is 1895.
A disgruntled detective is looking for meaning in his life.
A psychotic young man wants to make his darkest fantasies come true.
A secretive society searches for hidden wisdom in ancient manuscripts.
When these three meet, a series of events is set in motion which leads to a horrific crime.
A Glimpse of Heaven is a thrilling, page-turning mystery about spiritualism, the occult... and the quest for magic.
Summary:
The year is 1895.
An ancient manuscript claiming to hold the secrets of God’s creation;
A cunning old woman trying to make sense of it;
A deluded psychopath intent on stealing it away from her.
Private detective John Billings and his assistant Bartholomew Trotter have been tasked with finding a mysterious ancient manuscript known as the "Codex of Solomon" – a book of magical spells much desired by secretive esoteric societies.
They're not the only ones hunting for this artifact. A deluded young psychopath has already committed murder to find it. And a stubborn old woman thinks that this manuscript will give her the respect she so craves.
This is the latest in a series of Victorian mysteries exploring the dark side of the late Victorian era. It follows on from the events described in A Glimpse of Heaven.
Original Review August 2020:
Once again we return to Victorian England but this time DS Billings is just John Billings, private investigator. This is such a great series and so full of suspense, tension, and all around mayhem. What I love best about this series is the mystery is truly the main focus but that doesn't mean we don't get to see inside the mind of the detective, John Billings. Despite the time frame being wrong for noir, there is still something very reminiscent of the genre within the pages of this Victorian world.
As I said the mystery is the main bulk of the story but we get to see a little more of Billings' mind toward accepting who he is, his sexuality is brought in a little more each time. Personally I think he explored that side of himself more in the last entry of the DS Billings Victorian Mystery series, Anarchy, and yet we see him accept himself a bit more in A Glimpse of Heaven. With his new employee, intern, partner, whichever term you like, Trotter is just as enjoyable as Billings himself. I can't wait to watch Trotter grow just as we have seen Billings do throughout his journey. The potential to be a Victorian-non-superhero Batman and Robin is definitely there and I look forward to their working/friendship evolve.
John's friendship with his former partner, Sergeant Clarkson, is carried over into this spin-off series, which I loved. If you've been reading Billings' exploits from the beginning you know where his feelings tend to go when Clarkson is involved and now we get to see Clarkson's thoughts on Billings' inclinations. I won't go into more detail there because I feel like I've already said too much for those who have yet to start these stories but it's a wonderful and realistic progression.
As for the mystery itself, there is so many interesting and intriguing moments that I don't want to touch on because it truly is something you have to experience for yourself and as so often, every little detail is another twisted corner you have to wrap your mind around. Trust me, it will keep you on the edge of your seat from beginning to end.
I don't know if the author thinks of John Billings Mystery as a "spin-off" of the DS Billings Victorian Mysteries or just the next leg in the main character's journey but I call it a spin-off as it's just simpler😉. Do you need to read DS Billings first? Probably not but I know I wouldn't want to start with A Glimpse of Heaven, I'd want to see how and where John's story began and grew. I have a feeling that John Billings Mystery is more of an ongoing series than DS Billings, those mysteries all have a beginning and end but again I recommend reading from the beginning, if for no other reason than to see his evolution towards accepting himself as well as the friendship with Clarkson. However you read it, they are brilliant tales of murder, menace, and mayhem.
As I said the mystery is the main bulk of the story but we get to see a little more of Billings' mind toward accepting who he is, his sexuality is brought in a little more each time. Personally I think he explored that side of himself more in the last entry of the DS Billings Victorian Mystery series, Anarchy, and yet we see him accept himself a bit more in A Glimpse of Heaven. With his new employee, intern, partner, whichever term you like, Trotter is just as enjoyable as Billings himself. I can't wait to watch Trotter grow just as we have seen Billings do throughout his journey. The potential to be a Victorian-non-superhero Batman and Robin is definitely there and I look forward to their working/friendship evolve.
John's friendship with his former partner, Sergeant Clarkson, is carried over into this spin-off series, which I loved. If you've been reading Billings' exploits from the beginning you know where his feelings tend to go when Clarkson is involved and now we get to see Clarkson's thoughts on Billings' inclinations. I won't go into more detail there because I feel like I've already said too much for those who have yet to start these stories but it's a wonderful and realistic progression.
As for the mystery itself, there is so many interesting and intriguing moments that I don't want to touch on because it truly is something you have to experience for yourself and as so often, every little detail is another twisted corner you have to wrap your mind around. Trust me, it will keep you on the edge of your seat from beginning to end.
I don't know if the author thinks of John Billings Mystery as a "spin-off" of the DS Billings Victorian Mysteries or just the next leg in the main character's journey but I call it a spin-off as it's just simpler😉. Do you need to read DS Billings first? Probably not but I know I wouldn't want to start with A Glimpse of Heaven, I'd want to see how and where John's story began and grew. I have a feeling that John Billings Mystery is more of an ongoing series than DS Billings, those mysteries all have a beginning and end but again I recommend reading from the beginning, if for no other reason than to see his evolution towards accepting himself as well as the friendship with Clarkson. However you read it, they are brilliant tales of murder, menace, and mayhem.
A Little Morbid #2
Once again Olivier Bosman has created an intriguing blend of mystery, friendship, realizations, humor, danger, mayhem, and this time around wonderful travel to distant lands. John Billings just gets better and better with each book. They mysteries are always brilliant and though I may have seen a couple of points coming I was always left with the feeling of "wellllll, maybe not, maybe it's this" because the author always keeps his readers on the edge of their seats.
As for John, well he just continues to grow and accept who he is and though there isn't anything real "big" on the personal front, he continues to move forward, perhaps a bit slower at times than you want him to but always onward. As to his trusty sidekick/assistant, Trotter, we see a few new peaks into who he is as well and I have a feeling, like John, he will continue to grow as the series and their caseload progress. Together their friendship may seem only work related but I think they both realize, perhaps not admit, it goes beyond the office and caseload. Whatever it is and however you see it, it definitely adds an extra layer of fresh fun to the series.
Now I won't go into the mystery part too much, I will say that though it is probably more gruesome at times than any of the other cases in John Billings workload, be it as private investigator or Scotland Yard detective, but I also think there is a bit more humor than any of the others mostly due to Billings and Trotters' dry wit. I may have had more moments of "ewww" but also more laughs. I think the combination of gruesome and humor is what really made this my favorite one yet. A Little Morbid is simply put: interesting and attention-grabbing making for a flat-out wonderful reading experience.
One last note, some might say this can be read as a standalone since the case he is hired to solve has a start and finish but the truth is there are elements that carry over from A Glimpse of Heaven, I won't say more to that so I don't spoil anything but for me I'm glad I read book one first. Truth is, I'm glad I read DS Billings Victorian Mysteries series first. John Billings has grown as a character both on a personal level of accepting who he is but also as a detective and investigator. There are friendships that carried over into his journey as a private investigator that also made me glad I read from the very beginning. Having said that, you won't be lost if you don't read DS Billings first but personally I'm glad I did.
A Glimpse of Heaven by Olivier Bosman
Prelude
Extract from Alick Lourie’s diary, February 20th, 1895
Well, I’ve gone and done it now. I got kicked out of the house today. First Cambridge, now my own home. Although, in reality, Cambridge was not my fault. The trollop gave me syphilis, not the other way round. She’s the one who should’ve been kicked out of town.
But now I’m on the streets. Homeless. Destitute, with just an allowance of five thousand pounds a year to live on. How will I ever survive?
My mother called me the Beast. Not a beast, but the beast. The one from Revelations. I like that. When it comes to writing my memoir, I think I’ll call it Life of the Beast.
So, how did all this come about? How did I end up sitting in a hotel room in London, chewing on a dried peyote button, scribbling in this journal?
Well, I shall tell you. It all started with the aforementioned drug. The dried peyote which I brought back with me from Mexico. It opened my mind and allowed me to hear the voice of the spirits (I can’t remember exactly which one it was that spoke to me last night. Was it the angel Enoch? Or was it Baphomet? Or Beelzebub?) Anyway, it was the spirit which made me do it. It was the spirit which compelled me to commit this preposterous act, which was both shocking and beautifully poignant at the same time.
Perversion was its goal. To turn things upside down. To shock this dead, stale home back into life. To free myself and the rest of the household from the morals and conventions which have stifled us for so many years.
My mother had gone to church as usual, and Lucy was upstairs, sweeping the hallway. I was drawn by the spirit to go into my mother’s bedroom. This was the place in which I was conceived and born. The place where my pitiful life started. A suitable place, therefore, to witness my rebirth.
I opened the windows wide and let in the cold winter air. The draft seeped through my shirt and stiffened my nipples.
I could hear the ticking of the clock on the dresser. My mother would be back in thirty minutes, and Lucy would come in to tidy up in five. I remained by the window and took off all my clothes. The cool air caressed my body. Goosebumps rose on my skin. I caught my reflection in the mirror. Smooth white skin wrapped tightly over slim, rippling muscles.
The door handle turned. Lucy, punctual as ever, came in to make my mother’s bed. I turned around just as she opened the door. She gasped and put her hands to her mouth. But she didn’t run away. Nor did she stop staring. Lucy had been besotted with me for months. I’d noticed her blushes and coy glances every time I stepped into the kitchen or walked past her in the corridor.
I walked slowly towards her, grabbed her hand and pulled it away from her mouth.
“Oh, Master Alick,” was all that she could say.
I pressed her hand to my chest. Then I pushed it slowly towards my stomach, round my back and onto my arse. I squeezed her fingers around my buttock.
Her face blushed crimson. Her nostrils flared. Her heart pounded beneath her apron.
That’s it, girl, I thought. Let your will be free. Let your passions run loose. There is nothing more damaging to the body than restraint.
I glanced at the clock. Ten more minutes before my mother came home. I pushed her onto the bed.
“Oh, no, Master Alick,” she called. “Not here.”
But it had to be here. On my mother’s unmade bed. On top of the very sheets she slept on. This was a deathbed. This mattress had known no love, no intimacy, no life ever since my father died. I climbed on top of her and pulled up her skirts.
“Oh no, no, no,” Lucy protested, but she didn’t put up any resistance. Her eyes were closed, her breasts heaving.
She moaned as I thrust my cock inside her.
The headboard banged against the wall, shaking the crucifix on the wall above it. I looked up. Jesus’ woeful face stared back at me.
The front door opened. Lucy was too engrossed in her ecstasy to notice, but I listened carefully to my mother’s footsteps. Down the hallway, up the wooden steps and along the creaking floorboards.
I turned my face just as the door handle turned. She stepped into the room, and our eyes met.
She gasped but did not say anything.
I continued to stare at her while I pounded the moaning maid.
Lucy turned her head and saw my mother standing over us. She shrieked. She pushed and scratched and begged me to get off her. But I continued thrusting my pelvis against her, all the while staring into my mother’s eyes.
She remained rooted to the spot. Shocked into paralysis.
Only when I came inside Lucy did I stop. Only after the elixir of my new life had been released did I relent.
Alick Lourie was now officially dead, and in his place had risen the Beast.
A Little Morbid #2
Prologue
Extract from Alick Lourie’s Diary, June1895
A Woman of My Ilk
She stood on the foredeck, her hands on the railings, the sea breeze blowing through her thin white hair. She looked perfectly ordinary. She wore an ill-fitting lime green skirt, frayed around the ankles, a blue-and-white blouse that didn’t quite seem to fit, and a motheaten black shawl draped around her shoulders. Just a poor, common, middle-aged woman who wouldn’t normally arouse my curiosity, were it not for her countenance. There was something about her posture. The way she stood rigidly upright against the wind, as if she were in command of the ship, guiding us all to our destination. This was a woman who knew where she was going. A woman in charge of her own fate.
It’s easy for us magicians to recognise each other. The hidden wisdom we carry inside us elevates us from the common man, and this is reflected in our posture. There is a certain aura about us, invisible to everyone else, which acts like a beacon, signalling to other magicians that we are of their ilk. It was this aura which drew my attention.
I stood on the starboard side, looking at her back, watching her shawl dance in the wind. She must have felt my stare poking her in the back (we magicians can do that), because after a minute or so she turned around and looked at me. I held my stare. I looked straight into her eyes for a couple of beats, then, unbuttoning my jacket, turned my back on her and strolled back into the cabin. Contact had been made. It wouldn’t be long before she approached and inquired about my identity.
I knew who she was, of course. There is only one magician that fits her description: Ruth Grenfell, the keeper of Solomon’s Sephardic secrets. She was fleeing to France. Just like I was. Except I was running away from the police. She was running away from people like me who are after her manuscript.
My heart pounded as I made my way to the ship’s lounge. There is no such thing as coincidence in a magician’s life. There is only fate and providence. So, Mrs Grenfell was on this steamer. That meant that her manuscript, the Codex of Solomon, the text which revealed the secrets of God’s creation, the very thing I’d been yearning to get my hands on, was somewhere onthis ship too! I was still reeling as I took my glass of port from the waiter and sat on the leather settee by the window.
It wasn’t long before I saw her stumble into the bar, scanning the customers in search of me. A waiter approached her and asked to see her ticket – the poor ragged creature was quite clearly not a first-class passenger. But having located me at my table, she elbowed him away and marched straight towards me.
“Do I know you, sir?”
I looked up at her, towering over me. Her tanned, leathery face was aged and wrinkled well before its time, and there was a frantic look in those brown eyes.
“You were staring at me!” she continued. “Outside, on the deck. Why were you staring at me?”
The waiter approached us. “Is this woman bothering you, sir?” He grabbed her arm. She quickly pulled it away.
“Not at all,” I said to the waiter. “Please leave us alone.”
The waiter nodded and walked away. I smiled at her. “I’m sorry to have dismayed you. I didn’t mean to stare. I must’ve been daydreaming. I have a habit of doing that.”
“So we don’t know each other?”
“No. But I’ll happily introduce myself.” I held out my hand. “The name is Simeon. Faust de Simeon.”
“Madam de Martos,” she mumbled, shaking my hand.
Aha, I thought. Travelling under a pseudonym. Just like me. Madam M. How suitably mysterious. “I’m sorry to have bothered you,” she said, embarrassed. “I clearly made a mistake.” She was about to walk away, but I detained her.
“Please stay. Sit down. Let me buy you a drink.”
She stopped and looked at me. “I’m not supposed to be in here. I have a second-class ticket.”
“You can stay as my guest. I insist.”
She hesitated, but she eventually sat down.
“What will it be? Port?”
“I wouldn’t mind a glass of absinthe.”
I clicked my fingers for the waiter and ordered the drink.
“You’re very kind,” she said. She was blushing. “You must think me quite mad. But I’ve had some bad experiences in England, with men following me. I think I may have become a little paranoid.”
“Please don’t explain. It was rude of me to stare, even if I did so inadvertently. It is I who should apologise to you.”
The waiter came back with the green beverage and placed it on the table. She picked up her glass and held it out to me.
“Cheers,” she said. She took a sip and replaced the glass on the table. “I won’t be any bother. I’ll just sit here quietly and do some work.” She took some embroidery out of an old-fashioned white linen reticule wrapped around her wrist, sat back in her chair and began to sew. This was a bit rude, I thought. I had rather been hoping for conversation. But eccentric people are seldom well-mannered, and I knew of something which might spark her interest in me. I took something out of my pocket. My little book. Barrett’s Magus, which has served wonderfully as a calling card on previous occasions. Taking great care to leave the cover visible, I stretched my arms over the table, opened the book and began to read. It wasn’t long before her eyes were drawn to the book’s title.
“What are you reading?” she asked, her face flushed with astonishment.
“What, this?” I turned the book around and looked at the cover. “Oh, it’s just a book about magic.”
“Magic? You’re interested in magic?”
“I am rather, yes. It’s an odd hobby, I know, but I’ve been making it my speciality these last few years.”
“You’ve been studying it?”
“Well, I studied divinities and ancient languages at Cambridge, and I was a member of an esoteric society in London.”
“Which one?”
“The Golden Dawn,” I lied.
“I’m interested in magic too!”
I raised my eyebrows. “You don’t say! Well, what are the chances!”
“I’ve been studying it for many years. Well, I ain’t been to college like you, of course, but I’ve been taught by some very knowledgeable men. There was my husband, Phineas de Martos. You’ll have heard of him.”
I wrinkled my brow. “No, I don’t believe I have.”
“Then, after he died, I studied with Frater Sapienti from the Sons of Cain and Daughters of Lilith.”
“Oh, I’ve heard of them.”
“Do you speak Hebrew?”
I pretended not to know what she was leading up to, but inside me, my heart was pounding. “Hebrew? Yes, I do a bit.”
“Because I have a book, you see.”
“A book?” My heart almost leapt out of my chest. I had to button up my jacket lest she should see it pound beneath my shirt.
“I don’t have it on me. It’s hidden somewhere safe on the mainland. It’s a very valuable book. But it’s all in Hebrew, and I don’t speak Hebrew. I don’t suppose you could...”
“Well, certainly, I could. Will you be staying in Paris?”
“I’ll be staying at Madeleine’s Hotel for Women in Montmartre. Oh, I would be so grateful if you could help me decipher the texts.”
She reached her arm across the table and grabbed and squeezed my hand.
“Well, my dear madam,” I said, smiling at her, “I’d be delighted to.”
The four books in the D.S Billings Victorian Mysteries
are a prequel to A Glimpse of Heaven,
depicting the life and adventures of John Billings
when he was still a Scotland Yard detective.
Saturday's Series Spotlight
Monday Mysterious Mayhem: Anarchy
Born to Dutch parents and raised in Colombia and England, I am a rootless wanderer with itchy feet. I've spent the last few years living and working in The Netherlands, Czech Republic, Sudan and Bulgaria, but I have every confidence that I will now finally be able to settle down among the olive groves of Andalucia.
I'm an avid reader and film fan and I have an MA in creative writing for film and television.
A Glimpse of Heaven #1
A Little Morbid #2
KOBO / iTUNES / GOODREADS TBR
Series
KOBO / iTUNES / GOODREADS TBR
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