The book feels like watching a season of the popular TV show Game of Thrones, combined with an Agatha-Christie-like plotline. The suspense element is handled masterfully as Turton knows how and when to reveal crucial plot ingredients, keeping the reader on the edge of his seat, always guessing and trying to work out what is actually happening in the ship. Furthermore, the representation of an era is magnificent as the setting of the novel is the year 1634, and the author succeeds in bringing to life a long-gone epoch with all its peculiarities and hardships. The characters are so well-drawn and three-dimensional, regardless of whether they are likable or not, that the reader can immediately identify and root for. There is a mixing of different genres such as murder mystery, thriller, suspense, and whodunit with splashes of horror as well as hints to supernatural/paranormal intervention embellished in the text that makes for an unforgettable reading experience. The Devil and the Dark Water is Turton's second book and bears many of the traits that made his first writing attempt a much-discussed, bestseller. The novel won the Costa Book Award for First Novel (2018) while it was also nominated for the Longlist of the prestigious Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year (2019). Stuart Turton's debut novel, The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, was a massive commercial and critical success and established the English author as one of the most inventive and original crime writers of our era.
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