Blog #7

Aniruddha Joshi
English 1102
Dr Reynolds
March 10, 2009
The novel “Whitechapel Gods” immediately confused me as I was reading the first few chapters. S.M. Peters writes in a very disconnected way I felt. Between each chapter the book jumped from one scene to another very abruptly in my opinion. I was for the most part unable to make certain links between what the characters were doing and what the true identity of the characters was. Oliver, Tommy and Missy were the first characters which I actually followed as sort of the ‘main characters’ and as I kept reading, I became interested in what kind of people they were. However, I was very confused and really couldn’t keep up with the things going on with them. This did not bother me though. In all honesty, this actually made me keep reading the book to see what was really going on. There were also many plot twists and turns in the book and I felt that the book was indeed fast paced. The identity of Aaron was in particular quite surprising to me.
Another thing which interested me about the book was the image that Peters produced of Whitechapel. The city of Whitechapel was a section of London during Victorian times and is portrayed in the book as a very vile place to live. First, there is no freedom as it is ruled by these machines which Bailey and the other men are rebelling against. The city is blocked off by the gods and there is no free movement. Secondly, Peters describes the general aura of the city to be so polluted and dull due to the dominance of the factories and machines which spat out waste and smoke in the air. This may sound farfetched but I do think that Peters may be making a claim on the future of mankind.