Equally attractive is the unraveling of the clues. His brother and his family, his next-door neighbors, his valet (and sounding board), certain Scotland Yard inspectors, an American investigator who takes an interest in the case, even the attentive newspaper boy who always seems to reappear. Other characters in Lenox’s world are just as interesting as the young detective. The Last Passenger, for example, takes place in 1855-56, when Great Britain was struggling with its official position regarding slavery in America.
A Lenox reader learns relevant history, too, for Finch carefully sets each Lenox novel in a historical context. This novel, like the others in the Lenox series, moves seamlessly between the drawing room and the tavern, between the mean streets and the backbenches of Parliament, between upper class expectations and worlds of prostitutes and barroom brawlers. How he negotiates the balance between his career and his obligations to his heritage is a textbook examination of Victorian modes and mores. Most important is the fact that Lenox is a most intriguing character. There are several reasons for enjoying his subsequent ratiocinations. How could this murder happen on a moving train? Why did no one notice? The mystery surely piques Lenox’s curiosity. This anonymity, as well as the violence involved, pose a mystery. Anything that might identify the victim has been removed, including all the tags from the man’s clothes. The Last Passenger opens with a bloody, eviscerated corpse found languishing in the third-class carriage on the train from Manchester to London. He is fascinated, not only by the appearance of dead bodies but also by the logical progressions needed to solve intriguing cases without apparent clues. But Lenox, determined to follow his inquisitiveness and his instincts, wants to unravel mysteries and to establish a new profession.
Detective work, most assuredly, is frowned upon by others of his class. He definitely is not supposed to work at any sort of trade. I have read several Lenox mysteries, but not the two other prequels, so I was most interested to learn some of the underpinnings of his unusual career.Ĭharles Lenox, the second son of a wealthy Victorian family, was expected to join the military or the church, or else to lead a life of studied leisure. Interestingly enough, the latest three in the series, The Last Passenger plus A Woman in the Water and The Vanishing Man, are prequels that describe Lenox’s first cases when he was just learning the art of detection. The Last Passenger is Charles Finch’s thirteenth mystery featuring Victorian detective Charles Lenox. The Last Passenger, another story of Charles Finch’s favorite upper-class detective, Charles Lenox, detecting crimes in a dark and shady Victorian England.
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