Johannes Cabal The Necromancer by Jonathan L. Howard

It’s rare for me to find a book that I love on as many levels as I do Johannes Cabal The Necromancer. It’s got a hero who sold his soul to Satan in order to gain knowledge of the occult and how to bring people back from the dead. It’s got an evil, yet hilarious, circus – very Ray Bradbury meets AHS: Freak Show. It’s got a vampire brother who loves the ladies. It’s got elements of horror, fantasy, Gothic romance, steampunk, a whiff of H.P. Lovecraftishness, a very sarcastic Satan, and tons of witty, black British humor. Oh, and in order to get into Hell, you must fill out paperwork. In triplicate times infinity. I don’t know about you, but I’ve always pictured Hell to be place teeming with bureaucracy. It’s not compared to government for nothing, you know.

Johannes Cabal is a necromancer of some little infamy. Yes, that’s how he describes himself. He runs around in a black suit with a black hat, smoked glasses, a Gladstone bag containing his necromancy tools, various spells and potions, and of course, a gun. Because what else would a necromancer need besides a gun? Anyway, as the book opens, Johannes finds himself in Hell to demand Satan return his soul, as he needs it to continue his research into raising the dead, though not for the reasons you’d might expect.

Johannes Cabal is kind of an anti-hero but he is so deadpan, so witty and so unintentionally hilarious; and even though he raises the dead for a living, was responsible for turning his brother Horst into a vampire, and has no problem at all with swindling innocent people into selling their souls – part of his wager with The King of Hell to get his soul back – he is actually very lovable. I always enjoy when a writer is so talented that he can make an otherwise monstrous character into one that we love and root for. Tom Ripley is one such example, but Johannes Cabal is in a class all by himself. I guess the best way to describe him is that he’s soulless but he’s not heartless.

The characters are a motley crew of monsters, carnival attractions such as Layla the Latex Lady, a carnival manager literally made out of a bone, murdering magicians, swindling teenagers with attitude, a family of inbred and insanely wealthy misfits, a tough police detective trying to put all the pieces together, his beautiful daughter who ends up inadvertently helping Johannes Cabal break his contract with The Big Guy Downstairs, hilariously-named demons (Ragtag Slyboots, Despoiler of Milk and Tangler of Shoelaces, anyone?) and any number of snarky, witty, and grumpy observations by the necromancer himself.

Toward the beginning of the book, once Johannes has made his Faustian wager with The Devil and goes back to Earth to start the circus, he finds he needs the assistance of his vampiric brother Horst. Horst, you see, was locked in the Druin family crypt several years before by Johannes himself as part of his necromaniacal researches. The Druin family, the aforementioned inbred and wealthy family, are all gradually picked off, one by one, by a mysterious aunt – and Horst’s crypt companion – who had a taste for bloodsucking and killed her psychotic nephews and nieces in some very gruesome and funny ways. Beatrice’s particular peccadillo involved creating the world’s largest museum of peas, so you can well understand how and why she came to her demise.

Then, one morning, the surviving family woke up and found themselves short one for breakfast. They discovered Beatrice tied by her ankles to the chandelier. Her expression was one of purest horror and she was quite dead. There were a lot of peas in the room. The post-mortem discovered another five pounds of them forced down her throat, jamming her esophagus shut and clogging her airways.

Yes, I was again inspired to cook a dish by a passage about someone’s gruesome death. I’m kind of cool that way. Anyway, mushy peas are one of those good old-fashioned classic British recipes that have basic ingredients and yet are so delicious. When I was in London a few years back, I fell in love with fish and chips served with a side of mushy peas, and when I came home, I started making them for myself. Aside from the fact that they are dead easy, you’d be surprised at the number of people who think I’m a culinary genius for coming up with that method! I generally don’t clear up the confusion. 🙂 Classic British mushy peas call for using mature marrowfat peas, but I just channel my inner Nigella Lawson here and use a bag of frozen peas. They’re just as impressive and tasty.

INGREDIENTS
2 12-oz bags of frozen peas
5 cloves of garlic, in their skins
2 tablespoons salted butter
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 teaspoon salt
Black pepper to taste

METHOD
Heat a large saucepan of water and bring to a boil, and sprinkle in some salt. Cook the peas and the garlic cloves in the boiling water for about 5 minutes, then drain.

Peel the skins off the garlic cloves.

In the same pan, add the butter and toss in the peas and garlic cloves.

Add the heavy cream, and using a potato masher, mash the peas and garlic with the butter. You can use a food processor if you want, but the idea is to have a mix of mashed peas and semi-solid peas so I find it easier to get the right texture this way.

Taste for seasoning and add salt and pepper as needed before serving. Delicious! I served with a nice baked salmon fillet and it was perfect with a glass of Sauvignon Blanc. And nary a pea was to be found stuffed down my esophagus, either!