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Shadowboxing

The story of an American pugilist
by
April 2022, no. 441

The Sawdust House by David Whish-Wilson

Fremantle Press, $32.99 pb, 304 pp

Shadowboxing

The story of an American pugilist
by
April 2022, no. 441
David Whish-Wilson (photograph via Fremantle Press)
David Whish-Wilson (photograph via Fremantle Press)

In David Whish-Wilson’s new historical novel, The Sawdust House, it’s 1856 San Francisco, where the citizen-led Committee of Vigilance has convened to purge foreign undesirables from a city populace swollen beyond control by the gold rush. Of course, armed nativists ‘enthralled by their own performance’ are a common feature of U.S. history, from the Virginian lynch mobs of the late 1700s to that guy in the fuzzy Viking hat parading around the Capitol Building just last year. In an intriguing twist, however, the pitchforks are aimed this time at those ‘vermin from some hellish southern continent’, aka Australians, particularly a criminal element who congregate in a lawless quarter nicknamed Sydney-town.

Alex Cothren reviews 'The Sawdust House' by David Whish-Wilson

The Sawdust House

by David Whish-Wilson

Fremantle Press, $32.99 pb, 304 pp

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