London Fog: The Biography
Abstract
94 REVIEWS chapters on the Sabini family, focusing on family, community, and gang membership (where a mention of the Birmingham gangs sadly misspells Bordesley Green (176), which must be an editing error given Shore’s own Midland roots) and on Moll Harvey and her network of crim- inal associates are the most satisfying. Both cover a more discrete time period, and in the case of Moll, Shore builds a complex but also illuminating picture of lives spent in and out of court, negotiating with the law and with neighbours over decades of offending. A key strand running through the book, although not part of the title, is the importance of the press and print culture, both in covering crimes, and in creating a certain depiction of it. As Shore acknowledges, we see many of these offenders, and their crimes, through the prism of the press, and even when court reports are used, we are still hearing defendants’ voices through the mediation of a reporter or clerk. But others could also shape how we see, and hear, these individuals; as Shore warns, our understanding of the Sabini family’s involvement in crime, for example, is ‘unavoidably shaped by press and police construction