Siegel’s striking graphic novel tells the story of Captain Twain (no relation to the famous Mark), a steamboat captain and frustrated writer who discovers a wounded mermaid clinging to his ship. He brings her aboard, hiding her in his cabin and nursing her back to health—and becoming dangerously attached to her in the process. As he learns more about the mermaid’s story he becomes convinced that she is somehow related to the disappearance of his ship’s former owner and the strange correspondence being carried out between current owner Lafayette (the former owner’s younger, wilder brother) and the mysterious author of folklore studies, C.G. Beaverton.

A dramatic, though quiet, story is well-matched to atmospheric pencil and charcoal artwork. Fantastic and gripping.

It is 1912 and Sebastian Becker, former Pinkerton detective, is now an investigator for the Lord Chancellor’s Masters of Lunacy. His job is to investigate those “men of property” suspected of insanity in order to determine whether or not they are, in fact, mad and therefore incapable of continuing to manage their own affairs and money.  He is sent to Arnmouth, a small town home to the estate of Sir Owain Lancaster, a former master of industry suspected of having gone insane after a disastrous excursion to the Amazon which claimed the lives of his wife and son. Becker arrives only to become immediately caught up in the hunt for two missing children—who turn up murdered on Sir Owain’s lands. The parallels between this case and another many years earlier in which the girls survived their ordeal are obvious, and Becker begins to investigate, attempting to locate those earlier victims—one of whom is uncommunicative and unfriendly, the other of whom has repressed all memory of the events in question. Meanwhile, Sir Owain claims that the monsters which attacked his party in the Amazon have followed him home and it is these beasts who are to blame for the girls’ attacks. Becker must unravel the truth before more victims fall prey to the monster—or the man.

Well-plotted, with an interesting lead and a fascinating set-up, The Bedlam Detective is sure to appeal to fans of intelligent historical mystery.

Pepper, a big man with a big temper, is forcibly committed to the New Hyde Mental Hospital after assaulting three undercover policemen.  His stay, originally supposed to be only 72 hours, is extended almost indefinitely by a combination of potent sedatives and Pepper’s own bad decisions and volatile temper.  Everyone in New Hyde is medicated into passivity, kept restrained for illegal amounts of time for any infraction, and tormented in ways small and large by the underpaid and overworked staff.  Pepper soon falls in with a small group of other troublemakers, including his roommate Coffee; a teenaged girl who’s already a lifer; and the ward’s oldest female patient, who considers herself the mother to everyone else.  It isn’t long before Pepper discovers the hospital’s biggest secret…the Devil himself is kept in solitary confinement there, sneaking out at night to visit violence upon the other inmates of the wards. Or so the patients believe; according to the staff, he’s just a sick old man.  As Pepper tries to make sense of his new surroundings while surviving the Devil’s nightly excursions, a diffuse sort of plan begins to take shape—they will take revenge upon the Devil and escape New Hyde once and for all. But can they survive outside?

An odd sort of novel, neither truly horror nor truly realistic, The Devil in Silver is, at its core, a ringing indictment of the modern mental health establishment. The abuses committed within New Hyde are appalling, and the statistics given–medical, financial, etc—are equally so. 

Jami Attenberg, the author of this delightful new novel, grew up Buffalo Grove, and the novel itself is set in the Chicago suburbs, featuring many familiar landmarks.   For more than thirty years, Edie and Richard Middlestein have a shared a solid family life together.   They have close friends, have attended many spectacular b’nai mitzvah parties, and love their children and grandchildren.  Their lives are starting to fall apart, however, due to Edie’s increasing obsession and addiction to food.  As Edie’s girth grows and her health declines, their world together splinters apart.  This is a funny and charmingly poignant novel.  I highly recommend it for book clubs and everyone else who loves great character-centered family stories.