It seems that my reaction, whenever I finish one of Sherry Thomas’ Lady Sherlock books, is forever destined to be one of complete awe as I sit stunned, with my brain trying to catch up while I’m also trying to scrape my jaw up off the floor. I’m not sure I’m capable of forming whole…
Like many romance readers, we were quite saddened to learn of the death of Edith Layton in 2009. She had a remarkable voice that was gone from us too soon. However, her daughter has been working hard not only to see her backlist republished digitally, but to publish new work as well. Frost Fair is…
I’ve been a huge fan of the Mary Russell series since The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, which came out almost twenty-five years ago. After fourteen books, and five novellas, Mary Russell’s world is well developed, and definitely something I can highly recommend to historical mystery fans. While I enjoyed this most recent addition, it’s not my favorite…
A Forgotten Place is the pivotal tenth novel of the Bess Crawford series. Set in the months immediately following WWI, this book places army nurse Bess in one of her most chilling adventures yet. Because these mysteries are heavily character driven and the character building takes place across all the novels, I strongly recommend reading…
After reading and absolutely loving both Lauren Willig’s The English Wife and Beatriz Williams’ The Summer Wives, I was thrilled to see these two authors teaming up with Karen White, whose books have routinely been some of my favorites. I’m normally a little leery of author mashups like this, since some of the ones I’ve…
Lady Georgiana cannot believe her good fortune. At last she’s going to marry Darcy! The invitations have been sent: at 2 pm, Saturday, 27th July, at The Church of the Immaculate Conception in Mayfair, she’ll wed the Honorable Darcy Byrne O’Mara. Georgiana is staying with her friend Princess Zou Zou at Eaton Square; the bride-to-be…
Scandal Above Stairs, the second book in Jennifer Ashley’s series of historical mysteries featuring the no-nonsense cook, Kat Ashley, takes place a few months after the events of book one, Death Below Stairs, and sees our intrepid heroine once again embroiled in the search for a killer, aided by her love-interest – the enigmatic Daniel…
There are a lot of historical mysteries on the market these days, but not so many set in ancient China. And of those, how many, in English, were originally written by a Chinese author for a Chinese audience? The Golden Hairpin by Qinghan CeCe, originally written in 2015 and translated into English just this year,…
C.S. Harris has maintained a consistently high standard throughout her long-running Sebastian St. Cyr series of historical mysteries, but the last two or three books, in particular, have been outstanding – which is quite remarkable when one considers that this latest instalment, Why Kill the Innocent, is number thirteen. The individual mysteries are extremely well-constructed…
Long series and I are not friends. I tend to prefer story arcs that have a definite end because I’ve found that most which don’t wind up having a great beginning but increasingly weak novels as the series continues into infinity. Some writers rise above that though and Jacqueline Winspear is one of them. While…