The Devil and the Dark Water

This had an interesting setting, (mostly) on a ship heading from Batavia to Amsterdam in the 1600s. A sense of place is conveyed well, with the descriptions of the sights, the sounds, and yes, the smells, of a hard working cargo ship, but I didn't feel the same about the sense of time. None of the lead characters felt like genuinely seventeenth century people to me, and their attitudes and dialogue often felt a bit too modern, which undid a lot of the hard work put into the descriptions of life aboard the ship.
The mystery is complex and involving, with plenty of twists and misdirection, but the resolution is disappointing. The denouement and subsequent explanation was straight out of Scooby Doo, lacking only someone complaining that they would have got away with it if it hadn't been for those pesky kids.
Basically, the book's an entertaining way of passing a few hours, but little more than that.