The Devil in Amber is the second book in the "Lucifer Box" series, but author Gatiss is deft enough with description that there's no need at all to have read the first book (it will certainly deepen the experience, though). The setting is the 1920s in New York City and the English countryside, and the plot is pure adventure spy novel with tongue very, very firmly in cheek. The main character, Lucifer Box (all the characters have similarly fantastic names) is a secret agent and a portrait painter, and he's starting to have to admit that's he's hit middle age and is slowing down. That doesn't affect his high opinion of himself, though, nor does it seem to interfere with his love life (readers who are offended by homoeroticism be warned--though the sex is mostly offstage or only described in very general terms, it's definitely present in both hetero and homo forms).The adventure this time involves more than one improbable group of secret agents (one is hidden as the Royal Art Academy and another is based at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, while the bad guys are called F.A.U.S.T.), and a plot to release the very devil from captivity using an invocation written on a scrap of very old silk and the sacrifice of the perfect "lamb"--a woman who happens to be Lucifer Box's love interest. It could all degenerate into a silly-but-fun slapstick comedic adventure, but Gatiss's sheer skill with language somehow makes the whole ridiculous mess into a lush, exciting, readable tale that transcends its genre. Track down this series and read them all.
