Blog tour: The Blackbirds of St Giles by Lila Cain

This post is part of a blog tour organised by Random Things Blog Tours. I received a free copy of the book in return for an honest review.

‘Some things are earned. Some things are worth fighting for…

‘It’s 1782, Daniel and his sister Pearl arrive in London with the world at their feet and their future assured. Having escaped a Jamaican sugar plantation, Daniel fought for the British in the American War of Independence and was rewarded with freedom and an inheritance.

‘But the city is not a place for men like Daniel and he is callously tricked and finds himself, along with Pearl, in the rookeries of St Giles – a warren of dark and menacing alleyways, filled with violence and poverty.

‘The underworld labyrinth is run by Elias, a man whose cruelty knows no bounds. But under his dangerous rule is a brotherhood of Black men, the Blackbirds of St Giles, whose intention is to set their people free.

‘Can Daniel use his strength, wit and the fellowship of the other Blackbirds to overthrow Elias and truly find the freedom he fought for?’

In The Blackbirds of St Giles, by Lila Cain (pen name of Kate Griffin and Marcia Hutchinson), we meet Daniel – a freed slave and, more recently, a soldier on the British side in the American War of Independence – and his teenage sister Pearl as they travel to London to make a new life for themselves.

However, things don’t turn out as expected. The pair are tricked out of the inheritance that was meant to set them up, and are subsequently reduced to living in the insalubrious underground Maze of St Giles alongside other “Blackbirds” – desperate and destitute people whose plight the city ignores.

In the dank rookeries, Daniel and Pearl must do what they can to survive and move forward, with the help of several good-hearted new friends, and despite the machinations of Elias, an evil man who uses terror to control the district and intensify the suffering of its residents.

The Blackbirds of St Giles is a great read. You might be intimidated by its size at first (nearly 500 pages in hardback), but with so much to discover, and the characters constantly going from crisis to triumph and back again, I was totally hooked, and was left wanting more.

The authors describe every scene in careful detail, so I always had a vivid picture in my head, whether the action was taking place in an underground hovel, an upper-class home, or somewhere in between. Their descriptions also continually appeal to all the senses – well, maybe “appeal” isn’t the right word, considering the smell of eighteenth-century London!

I loved how this book offered something new as a historical novel set in Britain with a majority-Black cast. While there were tens of thousands of Black people in Britain at the time the book is set, when I’ve come across them in novels, they’ve generally been tokenistic household staff, or entertainment for privileged white characters.

It was therefore really interesting to find out how Black people lived and managed to carve out a space for themselves outside of these circumstances, and Daniel and Pearl’s story is just the tip of the iceberg. For the most part – as you might expect – it was a real struggle.

While it was gratifying to see how some of Daniel and Pearl’s new friends had succeeded, I never lost sight of the fact they’d have had to work harder than white people to achieve the same goals, and how precarious their positions were. The one Black character who manages to enter high society does so at great cost, and is still treated as an “exotic” novelty rather than an equal by the company she keeps.

Even though I knew from the outset that Daniel and Pearl’s story would feature a lot of setbacks (it wouldn’t be much of a story otherwise), I nonetheless felt devastated on their behalf when they transpired, and wanted things to come good for them.

I warmed to Pearl more or less instantly – she’s resilient and resourceful (though she shouldn’t have to be), sometimes foolhardy, and more worldly than her brother realises. Daniel, while admirable and often determined, can be frustrating when he keeps things to himself, and therefore blocks people from sympathising with and/or helping him, but a key part of his character trajectory is learning the value of teaming up with others in his position and sharing his problems.

Other memorable characters are Melkie, the larger-than-life Cockney owner of the boxing gym where Daniel trains for his new career as a fighter; Elias, the sadistic, almost pantomime villain who rules the Rookery and puts Daniel in a vulnerable position; and Jen, the rough diamond who proves to be an invaluable friend to the siblings from the moment they arrive in St Giles. In fact, as this story shows time and time again, poor people are consistently willing to share what little they have to help their neighbours survive, while rich people doggedly protect their wealth.

And in case this review makes the book sound very doom-and-gloom, there are some very witty scenes too – even towards the end of the book, when the stakes for Daniel and his comrades are very high indeed!

The Blackbirds of St Giles is addictive, thrilling, and original.