Rating: 
Summary: What a trip!
Review: A page-turner in the best sense of the term, The Lamplighter is both atmospheric and visceral, the writing witty and eloquent, the characters charismatic and full blooded, the plot exquisitely tight and best of all, the idea is fabulous. I couldn't have asked for more from a book and that goes for the second and third readings. The Lamplighter transcends genres with a story that frightens, challenges and illuminates. This is one very happy reader.
Rating:
Summary: Murder and Mystery in 19th Century Edinburgh
Review: Anthony O'Neill displays his great gift for story-telling by transporting the reader back to 19th Century Edinburgh. "The Lamplighter" conjures up images of granite tenement blocks, steep steps and twisting alleys. It is easy to lose yourself in this smokey city with its fog and dimly lit streets.
The introduction of a young girl - Evelyn, sets up an aura of intrigue. The action then switches to Chief Inspector Groves who is trying to solve several murders in the city. The murders are savage and inexplicable but Groves goes about his business with the typical doggedness of a 19th Century policeman.
The unlikely partnership of Canavan (a nightwatchman at a cemetery) and McKnight (a professor at the University) uses science and psychology to try to solve the murders. It is interesting to compare progress in the cases between methodical policework and imaginative theories. It reminded me of Sherlock Holmes versus Inspector Lestrade.
Anthony O'Neill's background descriptions of the seedier side of life in 19th Century Edinburgh had me peering through the gloom and choking on the smoke.
The finale is a terrifying flight through falling beams, Gothic buildings and bas-reliefs - reminiscent of the horrifying descriptions by HP Lovecraft.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book - it is intriguing and spell-binding,with more twists than the alleyways of Edinburgh.
Rating:
Summary: Haunting and thrilling
Review: Clearly influenced by Robert Louis Stevenson and Arthur Conan Doyle (both of them Edinburgh-born), the author has produced a loving, richly atmsopheric tale of the devil in us all. Partly a sort of demonic replay of 'DR JEKYLL and MR HYDE', partly a sort of Sherlock Holmes mystery (with rival investigations -- one by a Professor of Logic, the other by a self-aggrandizing detective), and partly, in the end, a quasi-cinematic fantasy, the book if familiar enough to be accessible but cerebral enough to be challenging (which may account for some misinterpretations evident in other reviews). A mind-bending book deserving of cult status.
Rating: 
Summary: This lamplighter winds up snuffed
Review: Does murder become her? Or in the case of the mysterious and imaginative Evelyn Todd, is it actually even "her" at all?Anthony O'Neill's sophomore effort centers on this unusual woman, who as a child in an Edinburgh orphanage let her mind soar beyond the gray walls. The repressive headmaster, however, was unable to keep his young charge sufficiently under his thumb, instead turning her over to "parents" she never knew. Young Evelyn then finds herself face to face with the once faceless lamplighter she would watch at night outside her window. At this point all Hell breaks loose. A couple decades later, people start dying and bodies are exhumed. The assistant police chief, seeking glory apart from his superior, takes on the case and immediately finds himself stymied at every turn, even as he uses the events as a touchpoint for a true crime book he's writing. Meanwhile, an intrepid professor McKnight and his walking partner, Canavan, also partake in the skullduggery, attempting to find their own answers to the crimes. Into this mix comes Evelyn, now an adult, though a highly confused one with a Jekyll/Hyde personality. Instantly, she becomes the focus of both investigations. But things take a strange twist when a supernatural beast appears to be committing the crimes--a beast that always leads back to this woman who suffered an arcane wound so long ago. Having read "The Dante Club," another book set in the latter half of the 19th Century and also featuring amateur sleuths of the academic kind on the trail of a hellish murderer, comparisons with this book are inevitable. Both also feature somewhat tortured dialog in keeping with the times, plenty of gore, brooding events, and spooky religious overtones. but O'Neill's book winds up on the short end of the stick. The problems here are multiple. The conjoined storylines seem odd, then resolve to further the plot, only the reasoning is highly forced and ultimately unbelievable. O'Neill also writes as if he has a screenplay in mind. That this work resembles so many of the forgettable movies scripts that have play in the cineplexes for a couple weeks and then vanish makes it more of a product of our age than the Victorian. Worst of all, the author makes the classic mistake of not really understanding the nature of the religious topic he attempts to manipulate in his book. This leads to a highly unsatisfying conclusion for people who DO understand. In the author's defense, his style and voice are very good, he paints his settings with enough detail to envision them well, and the story has a decent creepiness. This makes the lacks all the more glaring, unfortunately. If you want a Victorian murder mystery with a religious bent, go with "The Dante Club," instead. This lamplighter winds up snuffed.
Rating:
Summary: This lamplighter winds up snuffed
Review: Does murder become her? Or in the case of the mysterious and imaginative Evelyn Todd, is it actually even "her" at all? Anthony O'Neill's sophomore effort centers on this unusual woman, who as a child in an Edinburgh orphanage let her mind soar beyond the gray walls. The repressive headmaster, however, was unable to keep his young charge sufficiently under his thumb, instead turning her over to "parents" she never knew. Young Evelyn then finds herself face to face with the once faceless lamplighter she would watch at night outside her window. At this point all Hell breaks loose. A couple decades later, people start dying and bodies are exhumed. The assistant police chief, seeking glory apart from his superior, takes on the case and immediately finds himself stymied at every turn, even as he uses the events as a touchpoint for a true crime book he's writing. Meanwhile, an intrepid professor McKnight and his walking partner, Canavan, also partake in the skullduggery, attempting to find their own answers to the crimes. Into this mix comes Evelyn, now an adult, though a highly confused one with a Jekyll/Hyde personality. Instantly, she becomes the focus of both investigations. But things take a strange twist when a supernatural beast appears to be committing the crimes--a beast that always leads back to this woman who suffered an arcane wound so long ago. Having read "The Dante Club," another book set in the latter half of the 19th Century and also featuring amateur sleuths of the academic kind on the trail of a hellish murderer, comparisons with this book are inevitable. Both also feature somewhat tortured dialog in keeping with the times, plenty of gore, brooding events, and spooky religious overtones. but O'Neill's book winds up on the short end of the stick. The problems here are multiple. The conjoined storylines seem odd, then resolve to further the plot, only the reasoning is highly forced and ultimately unbelievable. O'Neill also writes as if he has a screenplay in mind. That this work resembles so many of the forgettable movies scripts that have play in the cineplexes for a couple weeks and then vanish makes it more of a product of our age than the Victorian. Worst of all, the author makes the classic mistake of not really understanding the nature of the religious topic he attempts to manipulate in his book. This leads to a highly unsatisfying conclusion for people who DO understand. In the author's defense, his style and voice are very good, he paints his settings with enough detail to envision them well, and the story has a decent creepiness. This makes the lacks all the more glaring, unfortunately. If you want a Victorian murder mystery with a religious bent, go with "The Dante Club," instead. This lamplighter winds up snuffed.
Rating: 
Summary: An interesting but tough read
Review: Echoing the feel of a good Victorian novel, The Lamplighter successfully pits men of Reason against the supernatural. I recommend reading this book as a piece of fine literature, but I must also warn the reader that it's not a light or easy read and requires attention. There were some sluggish moments, but the book's resolution was very well paced and rewarding.
Rating:
Summary: Plodding
Review: I found this book hard to stay interested in. I read at least 5 other books while this one sat on the bedside table waiting to be finished. I only made my self finish it because I had paid full price for it.
Rating: 
Summary: The Lamplighter
Review: I had high hopes for this novel, but instead it turned into a very good book to read if you want to take a nap. The author has a great talent for description, but abuses it in the extreme. He will use paragraphs to describe a scene, when a few lines expertly written will get the reader there much more enjoyably. There was so MUCH description, theological references and red herrings in the text that it put me to sleep quicker than reading a text on trigonometry. But, I persevered, as I was interested in what the 'beast' would really turn out to be. The finale was underwhelming in the extreme. We are supposed to believe that these people have walked in hell and come back out. I guess if I was a great believer that the devil likes to come and play tricks on police inspectors, gravekeepers, and professors, I might have found this a better read. I was very disappointed with the ending, the writing and the fact that I wasted my time.
Rating:
Summary: terrific historical suspense thriller
Review: In 1886 Edinburgh residents become frightened when a series of brutal murders occur and an eerie grave-robbing incident happens. The brass assigns Inspector Carus Groves to solve the case. Carus is a sanctimonious egotist writing his memoirs every evening, but turning the accounts into more of an autobiographical fiction piece than a biography. He sees himself as a hero on adventurer rather than a plodding cop though on this serial killing case he has doubts about himself. Retired due to age, Edinburgh University Professor of Logic and Metaphysics Thomas McKnight and his Irish friend Canavan, fired as the watchman of the cemetery where the grave robbery occurred, begin their own inquiries. The duo searches for a seemingly supernatural person who apparently tore an adult into pieces. The clues lead to publisher assistant Evelyn Todd, who returned to her home city where two decades ago she lived as a Dickens poster girl orphan. She knows too much detail about the crimes so McKnight and Canavan try mesmerism, Freudian psychoanalysis, metaphysics, and other isms seeking her link to the terror of the night. The atmosphere of a terrorized Edinburgh will be felt by the reader once the prologue is finished and the tale moves forward to 1886. The story line grips the audience as the reader compares the two investigations, but wonders if the culprit is supernatural or human. The cast is cleverly drawn to add depth to the tension while showing the foibles of the lead players. Fans of historical suspense thrillers where the tension just keeps growing will want to read Anthony O'Neill's terrific tale but remember to keep the lights on. Harriet Klausner
Rating:
Summary: The Lamplighter
Review: In a nineteenth-century Edinburgh both real and psychological, a brutal monster stalks the streets. This is a strange, strange book. O'Neill has a wonderful sense of incongruity and sometimes of humor, but often his diction is distanced and formal, in keeping with the historical setting but having the effect of pushing the reader out. The speculative elements are fascinating on an intellectual level--particularly the characters who may or may not be physically real--but despite the guts sometimes splattered across the page, I didn't find them viscerally effective. What was metaphor, and what was not? The boundary is uncertain. The distanced tone tends to rob the narrative of drama, though allowing wonderfully subtle turns of phrase. Here and there something in dialogue struck me as vaguely anachronistic. The leeries, though, were very cool. An ambitious book and an intelligent one, but one which in the final analysis never really engaged me.
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