Book review: The Inheritance of Solomon Farthing, by Mary Paulson-Ellis

Three years ago I described Mary Paulson-Ellis’s first novel, The Other Mrs Walker, as a neo-Victorian mystery with a plot as involved as anything by Wilkie Collins. Its successor is in the same vein, a novel set in the present day with its roots in the deep darkness of the past. There is one significant difference, however. The central figure in the first novel – the investigator – was a credible, if unlikable, character. Solomon Farthing, the “Heir Hunter,” seeking out the origins and connections of Thomas Methven, an old soldier who has died in an Edinburgh nursing-home, is likable but incredible. The author gets away with this discrepancy, if only just, partly because the plot itself is full of improbabilities. It demands a suspension of disbelief and is happily written with such an engaging verve that only severely critical readers will resist.