"This is an exhilarating romp through a witty combination of nineteenth-century English fact and fiction. Mark Hodder definitely knows his stuff and has given us steam opera at its finest. In this first novel, he shows himself to be as clever and inventive a writer as those who enliven his pages. We follow English explorer and eroticist (and king's agent) Sir Richard Francis Burton, poet and Sadean Algernon Charles Swinburne, and a cast including Florence Nightingale, Charles Darwin, Francis Calton, and Isambard Kingdom Brunel (rather different to those known to our Victorian ancestors), as well as the mysterious albino, Laurence Oliphant, in an adventure involving the very nature of time itself in a London filled with steam-horses and velocipedes where werewolves prowl the streets and Spring Heeled Jack, star of the Penny Dreadfuls, might provide the key to an ever-deepening mystery. A great, increasingly complex, plot, some fine characters, and invention that never flags! It gets better and better, offering clues to some of Victorian London's strangest mysteries. This is the best debut novel I have read in ages."
-Michael Moorcock
an imprint of Prometheus Books
Amherst, NY
Published 2010 by Pyr®, an imprint of Prometheus Books The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack. Copyright © 2010 by Mark Hodder. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, digital, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or conveyed via the Internet or a Web site without prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Cover illustration copyright © Jon Sullivan. Inquiries should be addressed to Pyr 59 John Glenn Drive Amherst, New York 14228-2119 VOICE: 716-691-0133 FAX: 716-691-0137 WWW.PYRSF.COM
14 13 12 11 10 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Hodder, Mark, 1962The strange affair of Spring Heeled Jack / by Mark Hodder. p. cm. ISBN 978-1-61614-240-7 (pbk.) 1. Burton, Richard Francis, Sir, 1821-1890-Fiction. 2. Swinburne, Algernon Charles, 1837-1909-Fiction. 3. Spring heeled Jack (Legendary character)-Fiction. 4. Criminal investigation-England-London-Fiction. 5. Victoria, Queen of Great Britain, 1819-1909-Assassination attempts-Fiction. 6. Great Britain-Social conditions-19th century-Fiction. I. Title. PR6108.O28S77 2010 823'.92-dc22 2010020632 Printed in the United States of America
Dedicated to my father
MICHAEL JOHN HODDER
