Ain't nowt so wretched as wretched folk...

Haunted by shadows. Burdened by the past

The Wretched opens on the undulating landscape of Dartmoor in 1885, we are with escaped convict John 'Fistie' Fitzpatrick, on the run from the eponymous prison. Fitzpatrick is a character we have come across before - he was in The Carpetbagger but has now been given an afterlife if you will; a life above and beyond The Carpetbagger.

His escape has been arranged by Irish Fenians — but what is their motive? Fitzpatrick himself is unaware. In an almost cinematic moment, Fitzpatrick stands on the bleak moorland and decries, "Free Fistie!"

From this point however, things become complicated...

Scotland Yard dispatches Detective Inspector Raymond Briggs to hunt down Fitzpatrick. Once a respected officer, Briggs is now broken by the trauma he endured during a previous case and is dismissed by colleagues as washed up and worse… This case may be his last chance to prove otherwise.

As his aide, Briggs enlists trusted ally, Isidore Runce—newly appointed to Scotland Yard’s Records Department. Isidore is fearless, sharp, and unconventional, qualities Briggs desperately needs.

Through a labyrinth of Fenian conspiracies; police corruption and buried secrets, Briggs pursues his quarry from the bleakness of Dartmoor to Bristol’s underworld and then a final reckoning on the gaslit streets of Whitechapel.

A theme running through The Wretched is one of fatalism: are wretches born and remain so throughout their lives, unable to break free? Or can they rise above wretchedness? This is very much riffing on the Victorian belief that one’s fate, nay destiny, is unchangeable and uncontrollable. At times, the characters in The Wretched ponder upon this. Not in a meditative way though, more a passing thought… They have far much more to fret over.

This is also a story about trauma and dealing with the damage one person can inflict upon another and the psychological scaring that is left. Is a person able to rise above such damaging trauma and defeat, surmount or control it?

And above all else, The Wretched is a crime thriller in which a group of Fenians think they have pulled off something that transcends their usual, work-a-day criminal activities. Only not everything is straightforward…either for them, Fitzpatrick, Briggs, Isidore or the Bristol police.

The Wretched is published as an ebook at the end of August 2025. Read a draft of the beginning now - click this link.