October 31, 2011
Set in 1868 Boston, the latest historical fiction from Pearl (The Dante Club) finds protagonist Marcus Mansfield on the cusp of graduation from the newly formed Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he studies intently, spies on the Catholic girls’ school, and fights Harvard’s unfriendly rowing team. Life at the school is upended after a strange set of calamities takes place. In foggy Boston Harbor, ships collide, and all the glass in the city’s central commercial district suddenly liquefies, maiming and killing Bostonians. The police are at a loss, not sure if these are crimes at all. Harvard’s best—and mostly incompetent—minds are enlisted to solve the crime, leaving Mansfield and his friends no option but to form a secret club and solve the mystery themselves. In order to do so, they must contend with a scarred man, Harvard’s satanic Medical Faculty (Med Fac) club, and antiscience trade unionists. Lighter than his previous novels, Pearl again blends detective fiction with historical characters (such as pioneering feminist and MIT-trained scientist Ellen Swallow), and his cast reads like a who’s who of 19th-century Boston. The novel is lighter than some of Pearl’s previous work, but still great fun to read.