Ellie Higson believes that spiritualist Mrs Vanguard can hear the voices of the dead, but Henry Gordon Jago thinks it’s all superstition and theatrical trickery. But if Vanguard is a harmless fake, then why have some of those who have attended her seances disappeared so mysteriously? Jago and Litefoot investigate… and find themselves facing a deadly foe from the afterlife.
JAGO & LITEFOOT: THE SPIRIT TRAP
There’s little more Victorian than a mysterious séance, and Jonathan Morris’s “The Spirit Trap” plunges Jago and Litefoot into a particularly interesting one. Mrs. Vanguard (Janet Henfrey) is a spiritualist: during her ceremonies, one can hear the movements of the dead and speak to them using her as a medium. But she’s also a fraud – the haunting noises are from percussion instruments tied to her finger and her words to the dead are based on cold reading. But she’s also not a fraud, as she can interact with “spirits” in the room – apparitions of people from the future! And how do these spirits know the secrets of the people at the séance? Simple – they Google them (or the equivalent thereof) and look up their family history. This is the trick Morris employs to great effect: using technology we understand and presenting it from a Victorian perspective, where it appears magical. It also wrong-foots Jago – as a showman he sees right through Mrs. Vanguard’s deceptions and is genuinely shocked when she turns out to be right. The friendship between the two leads is wonderfully evident – Litefoot’s determination to solve the case is intensified as soon as Jago is caught up in it. “The Spirit Trap” isn’t quite as good as its predecessor but it’s another highly entertaining story in what is becoming a magnificent set.
8/10