Among the Mad

If your taste in crime fiction runs to blood, guts, and gore, youre unlikely to enjoy reading Jacqueline Winspears Maisie Dobbs series. If, instead, you favor a more cerebral approach focused on three-dimensional character development and psychological insight, youll find exactly what youre looking for in Winspears outstanding work.

Maisie Dobbs is a brilliant young working-class woman who gained an elite education under the sponsorship of the aristocratic family that employed her as a maid. Cutting short her university studies, she volunteered as a nurse in World War I, where she witnessed the conflicts senseless carnage first-hand and was wounded by the same artillery shell that eventually killed her fiance. Now, after years of apprenticeship with a physician who was involved in top-secret intelligence work, she is on her own. Maisie bills herself as a psychologist and investigator, and she quickly proves her skill in both arenas.

In Among the Mad, the sixth novel of twelve (so far) in the series, 33-year-old Maisie finds herself and her sidekick, Billy Beale, pressed into service by New Scotland Yards secretive Special Branch. Together with her on-again, off-again friend and collaborator, Inspector Stratton, and the head of Special Branch, she is charged with finding the man who has threatened the Prime Minister himself. The wide-ranging search takes her and her colleagues into the worlds of Britains emerging Fascist Party, the militant labor movement, the countrys growing chemical-warfare program, and the network of asylums where shell-shocked soldiers and others deemed mad are locked away.

The action in Among the Mad unfolds over the last week of 1931 and the first month of 1932, a time when Britain was experiencing the worst of the Great Depression. As its title suggests, one of the books overarching themes is the primitive care of mental illness in that era. As in previous novels in the series, the persistent impacts of World War I loom large, too. But equally important is the emphasis on the desperation of the millions of men now out of work, many of them veterans of the war. With cameo appearances by two prominent historical figuresLabour Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald and future Fascist Party founder Sir Oswald MosleyAmong the Mad qualifies as a superior historical novel as well as first-class detective fiction.

A fascinating and vivid look at overall psychiatric care in the 30’s; and also an intimate focus on the workings of one particularly damaged and abused mind. As a psychology student myself, I was riveted. As an observer of human cruelties to one another; I was torn to my very core. Too often we overlook the pain of the mentally ill, especially those who are left to adapt to normal everyday life with little or no support in transition. Even today, 80 years later, Veterans with mental health problems struggle to get appropriate care. Jaqueline Winspear has done an excellent job at painting a sensitive – but at the same time, horrifying – picture of what possible tragedies can result when secret Government and Military programs are not carefully monitored, and individuals become the collateral damage. Her writing made me cry and made me tremble in fear. I highly recommend this book.

Among the Mad (the title is culled from a line in Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland when the White Cat tells Alice she is dwelling in the land of the mad). is the sixth detective novel in the Maisie Dobbs series by Jacqueline Winspear a British woman now living in California. I have become addicted to these novels concerning a female sleuth in the 1930s-1940s who lives in London. Maisie is a brilliant investigator. She still is grieving over the recent death of Dr. Simon Lynch her World War I lover who was so severely wounded in the war that he spent his last years living as a virtual vegetable. Her assistant in her detective agency is Billie Beale a resourceful Cockney veteran of the trench warfare of the Great War.
The Plot: It is Christmas Eve 1931. Maisie is walking down the street when she sees a disabled man blow himself up with a Mills hand grenade. She is then called in to Scotland Yard to deal with anonymous letters mailed to the Prime Minister and other officials from a mad bomber. Maisie is charged with finding the bomber before it is too late to prevent a disaster. Maisie also has to deal with helping Billie Beale whose wife Doreen is deeply depressed due to the death of the couple’s baby daughter. Doreen is placed in a mental institution where Maisie seeks out help from good doctors. Maisie also seeks to help her friend Priscilla deal with her alcoholic problem and grief over loved ones. The story deals with shellshock and battlefield trauma victims. The novel gives us a good view at London in the Great Depression. Winspear delights in letting us know what women are wearing and what is for dinner! This was not my favorite Maisie Dobbs novel but it was an enjoyable read.

Winspear has crafted one of the best mystery series that I have read. Set in England spanning the period from the end of WW1 into WW2, the characters are fascinating and the mystery-component is intriguing in each book as well as the terrific descriptions of all economic levels of English life. These books should really be read in order since each one builds on the history and development of each character. I certainly hope that the author does not run out of ideas for future installments! I highly recommend.

Set between the wars, at a time when unemployment was rife, Maisie Dobbs has set herself up as a private investigator offering a very discrete service. With her assistant, Billy, and a few good contacts, she becomes involved in trying to track down someone who poses a considerable threat to the nation. Masie has also begun to recognize that all work and no play makes for a very dull time.

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