The Devil’s Wind
Steve Goble
Seventh Street Books
print $15.99
ebook $9.99

I’d like to thank Seventh Street Books for sending me the review copy of this novel.

About this time last year, Steve Goble’s first novel, The Bloody Black Flag, hit shelves.  I loved it.  Spider John is back, and if anything, The Devil’s Wind is better than The Bloody Black Flag.

Here’s the setup.  Spider John and the few surviving members of the crew we met in The Bloody Flag are trying to escape Jamaica. Spider John just wants to return to Nantuckett and his wife and son, whom he hasn’t seen in about eight years.  (I have to wonder what he will find if/when he manages to make it back.  Will she have been faithfully waiting for him to return, or will she have assumed he either died at sea or abandoned them and consequently remarried?  We’ll have to wait and see.)

Spider John and his friends sign on to a merchant ship heading where they want to go.  He thinks he’s through with life on the account.  Sadly, life on the account isn’t through with him.  It isn’t long before trouble rears its head.

First, one of Spider’s friends recognizes a passenger as a notorious and sadistic pirate.  The captain is recently widowed, and his beautiful daughter is on the voyage.  There’s another woman passenger who is more than just a lady traveling alone.  Things proceed without incident at first.

Then the captain is found dead behind the locked doors of his cabin, the apparent victim of a suicide.  The consensus is that he was overcome with grief of the recent death of his wife; the daughter refuses to believe it.  Spider John doesn’t buy it either and begins to investigate.

He uncovers a number of things.  If you want to know what they are, you’ll need to read the book.

Steve Goble (photo pirated from his website)

Goble crafts his locked room mystery with meticulous care.  The obvious solution isn’t really the solution.  What’s even more important is that he plays fair with the reader.  The ending is consistent with the clues that have been carefully placed in the story.

He also manages to build the suspense with almost all of the book taking place on a single ship.  Someone is a killer, but who?  Why is there a pirate on board, and what is he up to?  Why did the…no, I’ll let you discover that question for yourself.  I don’t want to give any unintentional spoilers.

The Devil’s Wind is a carefully crafted, character-driven historical mystery full of suspense and surprises.  Spider John is a conflicted, complicated character who grows and changes throughout the course of the book.  He has assumed a leadership role by the time the finale of the story is reached.  The other members of the cast are also written with depth. Goble is able to imbue the cast with their own unique personalities with an economy of words that many other writers would do well to study.

It’s not uncommon for a second novel to not quite live up to the standard set by a first.  That’s not the case here.  If you like pirates, mysteries, or just a really good story where you care what happens to the characters, you need to read this series.  There’s nothing I’ve seen that’s quite like it.  And that’s a very good thing.

The good news is that there will be two more Spider John novels.  Goble announced on his website that’s he’s signed the contract.  I’m hoping there will be more than two.

The Devil’s Wind is highly recommended. I’m writing this post on Monday night (9-10-18).  The book hits shelves tomorrow.  Look for it.