Title: Stone's Fall
Author: Pears, Iain
Published by: Vintage
Year: 2010
First published: Jonathan Cape, 2009
Date reviewed: 02.14
ISBN: 9780099516170

Whatever else, this book is an amazing achievement. It is really three stories, separate but intertwined; each could be a book in its own right.

Set between 1867 and 1909, the Stone of the title is a powerful and wealthy businessman, industrialist, banker whose body has been found after he apparently fell through a window. Through the voices of three different characters the story tracks back in time to unravel the connections between them and others which lead finally to an explanation of the true circumstances leading to Stone’s death. Along the way greed, espionage, love, betrayal, duplicity, and murder are all encountered.

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries British power and influence were at their height. The City of London financed the world – its industries, its governments, its wars. The book is set in that world, where as one character explains, “It’s not for my businesses to support the govenment, it’s the government’s job to make sure my businesses can flourish.” In Stone’s world banks and big business, especially armaments manufacturers, control and manipulate governments. Not much has changed.