This twosome of books is about the New Cut gang, a gang of well-meaning children based in Victorian Lambeth. On Philip Pullman's website he says:
"Thunderbolt's Waxwork and The Gas-Fitters' Ball are two of my favourites among my stories. There was going to be a series of six of them, but the editor who commissioned them at Puffin left to go to another publisher, and somehow they got abandoned.
"They're funny (I hope) tales about the children in the New Cut Gang, a mixed bunch of vagabonds and rascals in late Victorian Lambeth, and their adventures among the petty crooks and the showmen and the market traders of the time. I like the characters very much, and I love the setting; and one day I shall write some more stories about Benny Kaminsky, and Thunderbolt Dobney, and their friends."
I thought they were funny in places too, and I thought the Victorian setting really came across through the dialect and the use of objects from the time.
"Thunderbolt's Waxwork" tells the tale of how the gang got to the bottom of a counterfeit coins crime and "The Gas-Fitters' Ball" details how the gang solved the mystery over who stole the gas-fitters' hall's antique silver.
Of the two I preferred "The Gas-Fitters Ball" with its concurrent love story which was filled with humour and had a very poignant ending.
My main concern was whether modern day children would still be interested in reading about a gang of children from yesteryear but the stories flowed easily and probably kids of today would love the stories like I did.
(I got this book through Amazon Vine. It is listed on Amazon here.)
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