Description:
Welcome to 1874 Philadelphia, where there are more rats than people, and where the sport of kings is ratting--"pitting a dog, usually a fox terrier, against a sack full of hungry rats.... The trick was seeing how long the dog would take to kill all the rats in the pit." A good ratting dog can earn its owner $5,000 in just three matches, which is why a top Republican politician named Bunker looks up city detective Wilton McCleary when Jocko, his favorite ratter, is kidnapped and held for ransom. In his first novel, Mark Graham (whose great-great-great-grandfather was a Philadelphia policeman) captures the sounds, sights, and mostly the smells of a city that so far hasn't figured largely in the growing genre of historical mystery. He succeeds in giving both the city and his central character a distinctive flavor. McCleary, a Civil War veteran who thought he was immune to cruelty and violence, turns out to be an old softy--especially when a missing child enters the picture. This looks to be the start of a promising series, one that will hopefully move on to other sports than ratting for its inspiration. --Dick Adler
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