'Damn him!' he swore. 'There is no more harm in shooting him than a mad dog!'
The brutal murder of the Reverend George Parker in the rural village of Oddingley on Midsummer's Day in 1806 - shot and beaten to death, his body set on fire and left smouldering in his own glebe field - gripped everyone from the Home Secretary in London to newspapermen across the country. It was a strange and stubborn case. The investigation lasted twenty-four years and involved inquests, judges and coroners, each more determined than the last to solve Oddingley's most gruesome crime - or crimes, as it turned out.
Damn His Blood is a fascinating glimpse into English rural life at the beginning of the nineteenth century, so often epitomised by the civilised drawing rooms of Jane Austen or the rural idylls of Constable. England was exhausted and nervous: dogged by Pitt's war taxes, mounting inflation and the lingering threat of a French invasion, violence was rife, particularly in rural communities where outsiders were regarded with deep suspicion.
With a cast of characters straight out of Hardy, Damn His Blood is a nail-biting true story of brutality, greed and ruthlessness which brings an elusive society vividly back to life.
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A gripping historical drama, beautifully told, and underpinned by meticulous research. The best historical crime books root a compelling narrative firmly in the context of their era, and Peter Moore has achieved this in great style -
The book is vivid, intense and often frightening. Moore’s re-examination…has richness vibrancy and heft. His deferral of the solution and careful, almost novelistic release of information suggest the skilled restraint of a far more experienced writer. There is much in this brilliant, startling debut that will linger long in the memory, images that may even, for the unwary reader, make sleep temporarily difficult - Times Literary Supplement
Moore tempers his considerable research with passages of beautifully evocative prose that bring a bygone era and a small English village vividly to life - Financial Times
A fascinating piece of criminal social history… Written in the vein of Kate Summerscale's The Suspicions Of Mr Whicher, Moore's story is in many ways more compelling. The period he illuminates is murkier, and its protagonists more complex…a lively, atmospheric and gripping recreation of a terrible pact and its shocking consequences - Herald
Peter Moore has scrupulously examined every account of both murders… A detailed and convincing narrative that traces the crimes from their origins in arguments between parishioners and their vicar over dues of corn and sheep, to the grimly Dickensian menace of Worcester jail and the looming gallows - Mail on Sunday
Moore’s book is a work of scholarship as well as a crime thriller, recreating the world of two centuries past in expressive, erudite and discerning prose… He captures the village of Oddingley in oil colours and, like Constable, is alive to the beauty and restlessness of rural life… Impressive debut - Literary Review
Fascinating and informative, this is a meticulously researched and utterly absorbing non-fiction tale - Liverpool Post
A terrific read. First class research, beautifully written, a true thriller about an extraordinary story unfolding over thirty years two centuries ago -
I stayed up half the night with this one. I read it in my tea-breaks, I read it in my lunch hour. I read it in the queue at Tesco’s. I could not put it down… This is an instructive and utterly gripping account of one of the nineteenth century’s most infamous crimes. Peter Moore has done a fine job recreating a vanished society: its tensions, its manners, its robustly eschatological curses. Damn his eyes! God rot your bones! Mr Darcy wouldn’t have lasted five seconds with this lot...a vastly enjoyable read, packed with suspense and revelation… Damn His Blood is fun. Great fun. Squire Haggard meets Midsummer Murders: I couldn’t have liked it more - Waterstones.com
Moore's book is a 'microhistory', taking an episode from the past and employing it to investigate an aspect of society at large. Ultimately it becomes a portrait of the justice system at a time when modern notions of detection were in their infancy... A more than adequate replacement for crime fiction - History Today
Fascinating piece of criminal social history. As carefully as if constructing a thriller, Moore sets his stage. Written in the vein of Kate Summerscale’s The Suspicions of Mr Whitcher, Moore’s story is in many ways more compelling. The period he illuminates is murkier and its protagonists more complex - Herald
Moore’s book is a work of scholarship as well as a crime thriller, recreating the world of two centuries past in expressive, erudite and discerning prose… He captures the village of Oddingley in oil colours and, like Constable, is alive to the beauty and restlessness of rural life… Impressive debut - Literary Review
A nail-biter… Moore deserves praise for reviving a grisly murder case which transfixed the whole country back in the early 19th century. Along the way he has summoned up the vanished world of rural England - Daily Mail
Fascinating and informative - House
First-rate - Tribune
Compelling, thoroughly researched and elegantly written - Worcester News
Peter Moore is a writer and freelance journalist. Born in Staffordshire in 1983, he studied history and sociology at Durham University and then spent six years working in the media in Madrid and London, where he was head of publishing at an award-winning digital agency. He now teaches creative writing at City University in London. Damn His Blood is his first book.
