The Devil’s Road

While draining a pond during work for the construction of the Stockton to Darlington Railway George Stephenson’s workers discover a female corpse with a dagger between her ribs. Could it be Lady Beresford, a local baron’s French wife who mysteriously disappeared 20 years ago? The identity of the victim is at the heart of Jean-Pierre Ohl’s novel, a richly woven tapestry set during the rise of capitalism in England. The Devil’s Road has a Dickensian range of characters from the indolent lawyer Bailey, with a taste for Byron and madeira, his imperturbable clerk Snegg, the activist worker Davies and the ‘Corporal’, a veteran of the Napoleonic wars and Peterloo Massacre. There is even a role for the young Charles Dickens in this riveting story.