Synopsis
This tale picks up a few months after the conclusion of David Liss' first novel, A Conspiracy of Paper . It's late in the year 1721 and Benjamin Weaver is hired by a clergyman to investigate a death threat against him. His quest doesn't go according to plan, however, and Weaver soon finds himself falsely accused of murder, sentenced to hang and confined in the infamous Newgate Prison. He must somehow escape this fate, clear his name, and find those responsible.
The safest course, once having escaped from prison, would be to escape England altogether - but Weaver would not hear of it. He is determined to pursue his investigations in a London where he is a hunted man, with the very substantial reward of 150 Pounds offered to anyone who would help send him back to the gallows.
Weaver's personal and occupational struggles play out against the backdrop of the upcoming general election, in which the contending Whig and Tory parties seem equally corrupt.
Several of the other fictional characters are carry-overs from A Conspiracy of Paper. As in the first installment of his "memoir", Weaver is aided by his uncle Miguel and his best friend, the surgeon Elias Gordon. His cousin's widow Miriam, now married to a Tory candidate for Parliament, once again tugs on Weaver's heart strings.
Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, was a British politician of the Conservative Party who twice served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He played a central role in the creation of the modern Conservative Party, defining its policies and its broad outreach. Disraeli is remembered for his influential voice in world affairs, his political battles with the Liberal Party leader William Ewart Gladstone, and his one-nation conservatism or "Tory democracy". He made the Conservatives the party most identified with the glory and power of the British Empire. He is the only British prime minister to have been of Jewish birth. He was also a novelist, publishing works of fiction even as prime minister.
Henry Fielding was an English novelist and dramatist known for his earthy humour and satire, and as the author of the comic novel Tom Jones. He also holds a place in the history of law enforcement, having used his authority as a magistrate to found the Bow Street Runners, which some have called London's first police force.
Abscam was a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) sting operation in the late 1970s and early 1980s that led to the convictions of seven members of the United States Congress, among others. The two-year investigation initially targeted trafficking in stolen property and corruption of prominent businessmen, but later evolved into a public corruption investigation. The FBI was aided by the Justice Department and a convicted con-man in videotaping politicians accepting bribes from a fictitious Arabian company in return for various political favors.
John Aislabie or Aslabie, of Studley Royal, near Ripon, Yorkshire, was a British politician who sat in the English and British House of Commons from 1695 to 1721. He was of an independent mind, and did not stick regularly to the main parties. He was Chancellor of the Exchequer at the time of the South Sea Bubble and his involvement with the Company led to his resignation and disgrace.
The Tories were a political faction and then a political party in the parliaments of England, Scotland, Great Britain, Ireland and the United Kingdom. Between the 1670s and 1830s, the Tories contested power with their rivals, the Whigs.
The Radicals were a loose parliamentary political grouping in Great Britain and Ireland in the early to mid-19th century, who drew on earlier ideas of radicalism and helped to transform the Whigs into the Liberal Party.
Jonathan Wild, also spelled Wilde, was a London underworld figure notable for operating on both sides of the law, posing as a public-spirited crimefighter entitled the "Thief-Taker General".
David Liss is an American writer of novels, essays and short fiction; more recently working also in comic books. He was born in New Jersey and grew up in South Florida. Liss received his BA degree from Syracuse University, an MA from Georgia State University and his M. Phil from Columbia University. He left his post-graduate studies of 18th Century British literature and unfinished dissertation to write full-time. "If things had not worked out with fiction, I probably would have kept to my graduate school career track and sought a job as a literature professor," he said. A full-time writer since 2010, Liss lives in San Antonio, Texas with his wife and children.
Endymion is a novel published in 1880 by Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beaconsfield, the former Conservative Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He was paid £10,000 for it. It was the last novel Disraeli published before his death. He had been writing another, Falconet, when he died; it was published, incomplete, after his death.
Infamous is a 2006 American drama film based on George Plimpton's 1997 book, Truman Capote: In Which Various Friends, Enemies, Acquaintances, and Detractors Recall His Turbulent Career. It covers the period from the late 1950s through the mid-1960s, during which Truman Capote researched and wrote his bestseller In Cold Blood (1965).
A Conspiracy of Paper is a historical-mystery novel by David Liss, set in London in the period leading up to the bursting of the South Sea Bubble in 1720.
Events from the year 1820 in the United Kingdom. This year sees a change of monarch after a nine-year Regency.
During the early 18th century Great Britain was undergoing a government shift into a two party system. The prior conservative party, the Tories, was the primary political party, but at the turn of the 18th century the Whigs, a liberal faction, had begun to rise in influence. As the parties struggled for power in Parliament, tensions rose. When the Whig party continued to grow in power and influence, gaining more representation in Parliament and recognition in the general public, the Tories, found themselves challenged over their policies and opinions. The arguments of government went beyond the House of Parliament. Public speeches, debates, and other forms of popular influence arose, creating a new style of politics. This was the environment that Princess Anne found herself when she became Queen of England, Scotland, and Ireland on March 8, 1702. Her brother-in-law, William III of England and II of Scotland who had preceded her had been in support of the growing two party system, and in respect, Anne "endured" the Whigs despite her alliance with the Tory party. The tensions between the parties had escalated to the point where party members became paranoid of conspiracies and conducted plots against one another. The Whigs conspired assassination plots against important Tory figures as an attempt to make way for their policies and political agendas.
William Skirving was one of the five Scottish Martyrs for Liberty. Active in the cause of universal franchise and other reforms inspired by the French Revolution, they were convicted of sedition in 1793-94, and sentenced to transportation to New South Wales.
The Devil's Company is a historical-mystery-thriller novel by David Liss, set in 18th century London. It is the third of three novels containing the memoir of the fictional Benjamin Weaver, a retired bare-knuckle boxer, now a "thief-taker". Weaver's "memoir" began with Liss' first novel, A Conspiracy of Paper (2000), and continued in A Spectacle of Corruption (2004).
The Loyal Parliament was the only Parliament of England of King James II, in theory continuing from May 1685 to July 1687, but in practice sitting during 1685 only. It gained its name because at the outset most of its members were loyal to the new king. The Whigs, who had previously resisted James's inheriting the throne, were outnumbered both in the Commons and in the Lords.
The Atterbury Plot was a conspiracy led by Francis Atterbury, Bishop of Rochester and Dean of Westminster, aimed at the restoration of the House of Stuart to the throne of Great Britain. It came some years after the unsuccessful Jacobite Rising of 1715, at a time when the Whig government of the new Hanoverian king was deeply unpopular.
The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye is the fifth novel in the Millennium series, focusing on the characters Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist. Written by David Lagercrantz, this is the second novel in the series not authored by the series' creator and author of the first three Millennium books, Stieg Larsson, who died of a heart attack in 2004. The novel was released worldwide on 7 September 2017.
Quintin Dick was an Irish Peelite, independent, Conservative, and Tory politician, and barrister.
