Although I am not finished with this book yet, and I don't know how it'll end, I figured an early review would be in order. (That and the fact that it's by one of my all-time favorite authors. :) )
But first, I'd like to give a little background on the brains behind this book. Richard Harding Davis was born in 1864 to literary parents. His mother, Rebecca Harding Davis, was a successful novelist, and wrote "Life in the Iron Mills," (1861). His father, Lemuel Clarke Davis (1835-1904), a bored lawyer turned journalist, also wrote a novel, ("A Stranded Ship: a Story of Sea and Shore," 1869), although journalism was his forte.
He was always regarded by those who knew him as a big ham or showoff, and although he made a lot of enemies in college and high school, it would later pay off, as he not only became the model for popular American illustrator Charles Dana Gibson's "Gibson Man," but his clean-shaven appearance also had such a massive influence on American fashion that it was a catalyst for the eventual decline of the handlebar mustache. After dropping out of college and being fired from his first journalism job, he wrote "Soldiers of Fortune," which was an overnight success, and earned him a long and exciting writing career, although he continued journalism with much success. As a journalist, he also had an impressive track-record, as he reported on such momentous events as the Johnstown flood and the execution of William Kemmler, (the first criminal to be executed by means of the electric chair.)
His life was an extremely active one, as he traveled extensively to many exotic places, and he even bravely reported in militarized areas that were often too dangerous to venture in. (In fact, when he reported the shelling of Matanzas, Cuba, from a United States Navy vessel during the Spanish-American War, his headline-making report resulted in the U. S. Navy prohibiting reporters from boarding it's ships for the rest of the war. Was this for their safety? I hope so...) However, his devil-may-care attitude towards reporting on location during a war was an asset, because it led him to gain a more accurate perspective on all the wars he documented. These included the Second Boer War, the Russo-Japanese War, and World War I. Possibly because he couldn't or wouldn't take it easy for a while, he died very young, (a week before his fifty-second birthday in 1916,) but, as the surrounding circumstances suggest, (at least to me,) it could also have been because he was preoccupied with the very real possibility that the United States would enter World War I, (a possibility which was realized in 1917,) and that we as yet were not prepared for our involvement. (He was on the phone dictating letters about preparedness when he died of a heart attack.)
As a fiction writer, he was somewhat versatile, but he usually leaned towards either high society settings, or political settings. So this novel, a murder mystery, is somewhat outside his usual subject matter, although it has an abundance of high society, political, military, and even jungle expedition related themes running throughout. It is, in spite of the fact that he included plenty of familiar subject matter, his only murder mystery. Why this is, I can't say, because, in reading it, I find it to be just as masterful as anything else to come from his pen. His use of plot is extremely effective, as he can keep you riveted from the first page to the last seemingly without effort, and this book is no exception.
(Did he consider mysteries to be a weakness of his? Was he just not interested?)
Anyway, I am giving you a brief synopsis of what I read so far, but please be advised that it's very detailed and it might give too much away. (But if it makes you feel any better, I cannot and will not tell you how any of the reviewed books end. I'm not that much of a killjoy. ;) )
The book opens in an extremely fashionable and exclusive club in London, where a group of men are quietly gossiping about a parliament member who is sitting next to the fire reading a book. This man, called Sir Andrew, is getting ready to pass the Navy Increase Bill, which is very unpopular among those gossiping. (I chuckled inwardly when "the gentleman with the black pearl," as he is referred to, says "Now, had I the spirit of our ancestors, I would bring chloroform from the nearest chemist's and drug him in that chair. I would tumble his unconscious form into a hansom cab, and hold him prisoner until daylight. If I did, I would save the British taxpayer the cost of five more battleships, many millions of pounds.") One of them hatches a very clever plan to keep him from attending parliament that night by telling him a story about a murder he (supposedly) witnessed the previous night. (As they all know, "Shilling-Shockers" and any story involving murder and intrigue, are his biggest weakness, so they believe that they can use that to their advantage.) After they coax the reluctant Sir Andrew to stay with them for a few moments, ("You cannot leave us now," [the gentleman with the pearl] exclaimed. "Mr. Sears is just about to tell us of this remarkable crime.") Lieutenant Ripley Sears, (also known as "the American,") begins the story by telling about how, as he is stumbling through a dense London fog, (hence, the title,) he essentially breaks and enters into a private residence, (and I find it suspiciously bizarre how nonchalant the Russian servant is about this,) where he finds two dead bodies with tiny, immaculate knife wounds in each of their chests. After making a somewhat hurried attempt at finding out who the killer is, he thinks he knows the answer. But two other club members offer their versions of the story, (one of which involves an attempted robbery that occurred a while prior, and seems unrelated to the plot--a fact that earns its human source a good telling-off from the other club members.) The third adamantly exonerates the assumed suspect by revealing some conclusive details about the crime. This contribution to the narrative is ostensibly supposed to be what ends it all, although, even having read 88% of the book, I still can't see how. (There are so many plot twists in this book, it's almost ridiculous.)
I will finish reading this book soon, and will update you further, but I still believe that to truly appreciate this book, you have to read it yourself.
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