‘A Hidden Life’ by Mia Emilie (The Watchers Trilogy)

Published by Mia Emilie,
19 August 2019.
ISBN 978-1-9161399-0-9 (PB)

This book concerns a fascinating, real life, unsolved historical mystery - the death in 1560 of Amy Dudley (some other sources call her Amy Robsart). We plunge into the story when Sir Samuel Banks, the Sheriff of Oxford, comes to see the body of Lady Dudley which is laid out in a cellar of Cumnor Place.  It is his job, firstly, to find a jury to ascertain the cause of death.    Sam hopes to hand the matter over to the Justice of the Peace, Reynard, but the man says he is ill and gives the investigation back to Sam.  Sam has been a royal spy and death doctor and his skills in these regards are valuable as he tries to discover the cause of the death of Amy Dudley and whether someone was responsible for her death.

The way lives are lived in the 16th century is beautifully shown; the ordinary folk suffer harsh conditions -  wearing no shoes, being dirty and being totally dependent on the masters for food and lodging of the rudest kind, while the men of the upper echelons have to travel by horseback considerable distances in foul weather and be prepared to fight those who attack or traduce them.   The political machinations within the Court and parts of society are dangerous waters for gentlemen to wade through.  Those who are embroiled in high level politics have to have a group of men to use in protection or to attack other people.   Sam’s ability in a fight is a very valuable attribute which he has to use fairly frequently. 

Mia really illustrates the totally different attitudes and circumstances of the 16th century to our own while showing our common humanity over relationships within and outside families.   Realism in her descriptions helps to get that period feel.  She provides details in passing that illuminate the Elizabethan era, for example,  Hugh, the Undersheriff wears his writing desk - that is he has hanging round his neck a container with parchment, ink and pen - all men carry daggers, and there is the job of rat catcher in large houses and Oxford Colleges.  Whatever your status in society there is common ground in the experiences of deaths of children - in this case from the pox.

This is a rollicking story - exciting and frightening incidents abound as Sam forges on in the hope of solving the central mystery of Amy Dudley’s death.

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Reviewer: Jennifer S. Palmer

This is Mia’s first book and it is the first of the Watchers trilogy which will consider Amy’s death as three investigators in different eras try to solve the mystery

Mia Emilie lives in South West England with her family, rascally dog and a huge collection of books. Having studied creative writing from degree to PhD level, Mia was awarded her doctorate last year and is now a full-time crime writer. A Hidden Life, is her debut novel and the first instalment in, The Watchers, trilogy. 

www.miaemilie.com

Jennifer Palmer Throughout my reading life crime fiction has been a constant interest; I really enjoyed my 15 years as an expatriate in the Far East, the Netherlands & the USA but occasionally the solace of closing my door to the outside world and sitting reading was highly therapeutic. I now lecture to adults on historical topics including Famous Historical Mysteries.

‘Kossuth Square’ by Adam Lebor

Published by Head of Zeus,

4 April 2019.
ISBN: 978-1-78669273-3(HB)

In the Prologue to this compelling story set in the Hungarian capital Budapest, it is 1995 and a beautiful young Roma girl is about to enter a house where a party is going on. We can guess that something bad is about to happen but in this masterfully plotted political thriller we do not find out until the very end.

Move forward to 2015 and Hungary, now very firmly within the EU but one of its more awkward members, has a new prime minister, Reka Bardossy, who is where she is because she has ousted the former Prime Minister, Pal Dezeffy (also Reka’s occasional lover) following a political corruption scandal involving EU passports for illegal migrants some of whom were also Islamic terrorists. Reka was aware of the illegal passports but not of the Islamic terrorist angle; however Dezeffy certainly was and that is what led to his downfall. Now he is out for revenge and his reinstatement as Prime Minister. 

This is not something which concerns Balthazar (Tazi) Kovacs, the protagonist of this and the author’s earlier story, District VIII (see www.mysterypeople.co.uk/Reviews/L). He has been called out to an upmarket brothel where a punter has died. The awkwardness for Tazi is that the owner of the brothel is his younger brother, and like, Tazi, a Roma. Many of the Roma community are involved in the criminal underworld and this is why gadjis (non-Roma) are prejudiced against anyone of Roma heritage while Romas are antipathetic to the police. But for Tazi, irrespective of the immense ties of loyalty between each and every Roma, his first duty is to identify the dead man and how he died. The first is easy; he was a Qatari businessman, and it appears there was some link between him and the Islamic terrorist whom Tazi had killed at the end of District VIII, and there are doubts to say the least about he died. And the ABS (Hungarian Security Services), in the shape of the attractive and aristocratic Anastasia Ferenczy, is also on the trail as is reporter Eniko Szalay, Tazi’s ex-girlfriend for whom he still has some feelings. Meanwhile a youthful American has arrived in Budapest; his task, it transpires, is to assist Dezeffy in promoting his comeback through the most modern, media-savvy means available. Luckily for Tazi he is fully supported by his boss, Sandor Takacs. And there is a mysterious man referred to simply as The Librarian. But there are still numerous perils which Tazi has to overcome and much doubt as to the outcome.

I should say at this point that neither Pal Dezeffy nor Reka Bardossy ever have been Prime Minister of Hungary. That position is currently held by Victor Orban, himself a highly controversial figure. And there is no Gendarmerie in Hungary today, which features in both titles by this author, which he based on the fearsome real life Gendarmerie of the WWII years. These are perfectly permissible plot devices. 

Much of the story of Kossuth Square follows on from events in District VIII and is told through a number of narrators which makes events rather difficult to disentangle. A list of characters might have helped particularly and an explanation of how Hungarian, not being an Indo-European language, differs radically from most other European languages. And there is quite a bit of Hungarian history and glimpses of Hungarian life, especially among the Roma, which I personally found highly interesting and helped to give valuable increased context to the story. Recommended.

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Reviewer: Radmila May

Adam LeBor was born in London in 1961. He is a British author, novelist and journalist. is a veteran foreign correspondent who has covered Hungary and eastern Europe since 1990. He is the author of thirteen books, including Hitler's Secret Bankers, which was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize. He writes for the Economist, Financial Times and Monocle. He divides his time between Budapest and London.

Radmila May was born in the U.S. but has lived in the U.K. since she was seven apart from seven years in The Hague. She read law at university but did not go into practice. Instead she worked for many years for a firm of law publishers and still does occasional work for them including taking part in a substantial revision and updating of her late husband’s legal practitioners’ work on Criminal Evidence published late 2015. She has also contributed short stories with a distinctly criminal flavour to two of the Oxford Stories anthologies published by Oxpens Press – a third story is to be published shortly in another Oxford Stories anthology – and is now concentrating on her own writing.

‘Two Victims’ by Helen H. Durrant

Published by Joffe Books,
28 July 2019.
ISBN: 978-1-78931-160-0 (PB)

DCI Rachel King has two full time jobs.  The first is caring for her two daughters, Mia aged fourteen and Megan aged eighteen. Mia is still a reasonably compliant teenager although neither she, nor her mother’s divorced husband, Alan, who lives just next door and helps to look after the girls, have any idea that Mia’s biological father is actually Jed McAteer, a possibly/possibly not, reformed villain.  Megan is more of a handful.  In her first year at University, Megan is fighting for her rights and the freedom to do what she wants when she wants.  This includes heavy drinking at parties that are organized and attended by some highly undesirable characters.

Rachel’s second job is catching villains.  When we meet her Rachel has just been called to a murder scene.  A local nurse, ostensibly a kind-hearted do-gooder, Agnes Moore, has been shot in the head and dumped in a ditch on a building site. A second body is found further along the ditch. This time the victim is a girl in her early twenties, also with a hole in her head. Jed McAteer, Rachel’s former lover, owns the site.

Helped by her loyal sergeant, Elwyn Pryce and two constables, Rachel begins to investigate the deaths, but she has a battle on her hands.  Jed McAteer puts pressure on Rachel’s boss to get the job done quickly and get off his land. Then DCI Mark Kenton, a detective from Salford CID, keeps trying to take over the investigation. Although Kenton has the backing of the top brass, Rachel does her best to carry on, particularly when it seems that young foreign girls are being groomed and forced to work as sex slaves.

Rachel’s family life and work life become intertwined as Jed McAteer, whom Sergeant Pryce believes Rachel still loves, moves back into her life. Not everything is as straightforward as it seems - this is especially true of Agnes Moore’s efforts to help girls who find themselves in trouble. We also end up with a slightly unusual and unexpected murderer.

Two Victims is a fairly short book. It rattles along at a good pace and is an easy read with some very engaging characters. I thoroughly enjoyed it and have no hesitation in recommending to anyone who enjoys a good murder mystery.

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Reviewer Angela Crowther

Helen H. Durrant writes gritty police procedurals and is published by Joffe Books. Until six years ago she hadn’t written a word, now she has sixteen titles out there and counting. Her novels are set in the Pennine villages outside Manchester. Writing was a dormant ambition. It was retirement that gave her the opportunity to have a go. The success of her books came as a huge surprise, now she can’t stop! 

www.helenhdurrant.co.uk

Angela Crowther is a retired scientist.  She has published many scientific papers but, as yet, no crime fiction.  In her spare time Angela belongs to a Handbell Ringing group, goes country dancing and enjoys listening to music, particularly the operas of Verdi and Wagner.

‘The Love Detective: Next Level’ by Angela Dyson

Published by Matador,
10 September. 2019.
ISBN: 978-1-83859057-4 (PB)

This is light-hearted, fun read that has the reader smiling if not laughing out loud from the start. In the same vein as Janet Evanovich’s madcap Stephanie Plumb, Ann Granger’s Fran Varady and a much younger version of MC Beaton’s Agatha Raison, Clarry Pennhaligan has the habit of getting herself into some perilous scrapes.   

Waitress Clarry Pennhaligan has earned herself a reputation as an amateur detective. She is hired by the formidable Diana Maitland to investigate her daughter’s new friends. Mrs Maitland is concerned that they are have a bad effect on the impressionable Vanessa who has become very secretive. The group of women she is now associating with appear to belong to an alternative religious cult interested in folklore and paganism. Finding it hard to pay her bills, Clarry reluctantly agrees to take on the case.

Diana Maitland proposes that Clarry attends an anniversary party that she is hosting posing as a friend of her eldest daughter and use the opportunity to meet and befriend Vanessa. The introduction doesn’t go to well and only when Clarry discovers Vanessa trying to escape the party and helps her evade her mother’s clutches do they form a tentative bond. This eventually leads to Clarry attending a meeting of the ‘Women’s Group.’ Before long, it becomes obvious that there is something more sinister going on than just a collection of modern New Age hippies worshipping the goddess. All the women are being encouraged to contribute generously to the building of a Wellbeing Centre. 

Learning that Vanessa is about to come into a considerable legacy, Clarry’s suspicions are roused. She sets about trying to discover more about the group’s members, especially Sarah, who manages the group’s not inconsiderable finances. Aided by her elderly aunt Fran, Clarry breaks into Sarah’s shop late at night and the two barely escape by climbing over the rooftops.   

There is nothing two-dimensional about the characters. In addition to Clarry herself and the plucky go-getting elderly Fran, I particularly like her mates in the restaurant where she works as a waitress. The rugby club evening is something I will remember for some time and it’s on that occasion she meets Ed who I’m sure will feature in the next book in this series.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and have no reservations recommending it to readers who are looking for an easy read with wit and humour mixed with excitement and intrigue.

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Reviewer: Judith Cranswick  

Angela Dyson, creator of the of the Clarry Pennhaligan mysteries, also write a series, The Fortunes of Sally Forth, featuring a woman who has swapped London Living for Country Loving - something she has recently done herself. Her play, The Gift, premiered at The White Bear Theatre, London. She also won ITV's This Morning's national short story award.

Judith Cranswick was born and brought up in Norwich. She wrote her first novel (now languishing in the back of a drawer somewhere) when her two children were toddlers, but there was little time for writing when she returned to work teaching Geography in a large comprehensive. It was only after leaving her headship that she was able to take up writing again in earnest. Judith teaches Tai Chi, and line dancing, yoga, Pilates and Zumba. Her other hobbies include reading and travelling. She is lucky enough to be a cruise lecturer. You can read some of her adventures – the Ups and Downs of Being a Cruise Lecturer on her September 2014 blog on her home page. Judith’s latest book is Blood Flows South to read a review click on the title

http://judithcranswick.co.uk/

2019 CWA Daggers

Congratulations
to Mystery People  winners.

M.W. Craven won the CWA Gold Dagger for his novel
The Puppet Show.
The first in his Detective Washington Poe series.
Craven served in the armed forces and became a probation officer before  started his career as an author.
Mike is a member of the Crime Writers Association and Mystery People.

Photo on the left Mike with his agent
David Headley.

The CWA Dagger in The Library went to Kate Ellis, who was previously shortlisted in 2017.
Kate's novels feature archaeology graduate Detective Sergeant Wesley Peterson who fights crime in South Devon.  Each story combines an intriguing contemporary murder mystery with a parallel historical case. She has also written five books in the spooky Joe Plantagenet series set up in North Yorkshire as well as many short stories for crime fiction anthologies and magazines. Kate was elected a member of The Detection Club in 2014. She is a member of the Crime Writers Association, the Murder Squad, and Mystery People.

CWA Short Story Dagger was won by Danuta Kot writing as Danuta Reah : for The Dummies’ Guide to Serial Killing in The Dummies’ Guide to Serial Killing and other Fantastic Female Fables.
Danuta had her first novel Only Darkness published in 1999.Danuta also writes as Carla Banks.  She lives in Yorkshire.

She is past Chair of the Crime Writers' Association, and a member of Mystery People. 

For a complete list of all the winners
2019 CWA Daggers – The Winners

2019 CWA Daggers – The Winners

CWA GOLD DAGGER: M. W. Craven: The Puppet Show (Constable / Little Brown)

CWA JOHN CREASEY NEW BLOOD: Chris Hammer: Scrublands (Wildfire)

CWA ALCS GOLD DAGGER FOR NON-FICTION: Ben Macintyre: The Spy and the Traitor (Viking)

CWA IAN FLEMING STEEL DAGGER: Holly Watt: To The Lions (Raven Books)

CWA INTERNATIONAL DAGGER: Dov Alfon: A Long Night in Paris, tr Daniella Zamir (MacLehose Press)

CWA SAPERE BOOKS HISTORICAL DAGGER: S.G. MacLean: Destroying Angel (Quercus Fiction)

CWA SHORT STORY DAGGER: Danuta Kot writing as Danuta Reah: ‘The Dummies’ Guide to Serial Killing’ in The Dummies’ Guide to Serial Killing and other Fantastic Female Fables (Fantastic Books)

Highly commended: Teresa Solana:  ‘I Detest Mozart’ in The First Prehistoric Serial Killer and Other Stories by Teresa Solana (Bitter Lemon Press)

CWA DAGGER IN THE LIBRARY: Kate Ellis

CWA DEBUT DAGGER: Shelley Burr: Wake

BEST CRIME AND MYSTERY PUBLISHER: No Exit Press

‘The Fourth Courier’ by Timothy Jay Smith

Published by Arcade Publishing,
18 April 2019.
ISBN: 978-194892-410-8 (HB)

April in Warsaw 1992 and bitterly cold, and a young American FBI agent, Jay Porter, is on the banks of the River Vistula, looking at a dead body. He is with two Polish police officers, the glamorous Basia Husarska, Director of the Bureau of Organized Crime, and Detective Leczek Kulski. He is here because there is concern in the United States that, with the collapse of the Soviet Union with its domination of Eastern European states and the resulting growth of criminal smuggling networks across those countries particularly Poland, there could be not only a ferocious and violent drugs trade but something more deadly, more to be feared: nuclear smuggling. And now several bodies have been found, all with signs of violent death, and with traces of nuclear material on their hands. More concerning still is that the dead men are Russian. And meanwhile war is brewing in the Balkans. So Jay who is not himself a nuclear scientist but who has, due to family connections, an interest in and some knowledge of the subject, volunteers for the assignment and hastily embarks on a crash course in Polish. 

And there is indeed a Balkan connection: a sinister Serb general is in contact with Dr Sergei Ustinov, a Russian physicist who has been working on a portable atomic bomb. Ustinov is planning to defect to the West and this would very much suit the general who dreams of using such a bomb to secure his desire to ensure that Serbia is the dominant power in what was then still Yugoslavia but falling apart in the growing Balkan wars. Meanwhile, Jay is becoming attracted to Lilja, an attractive Polish airhostess.

This is a fast-moving tale with a number of characters whose separate narratives all come together by the end.

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Reviewer: Radmila May

Timothy Jay Smith has travelled the world collecting stories and characters for his novels and screenplays which have received high praise. Fire on the Island won the Gold Medal in the 2017 Faulkner-Wisdom Competition for the Novel. He won the Paris Prize for Fiction for his first book, A Vision of Angels. Kirkus Reviews called Cooper’s Promise “literary dynamite” and selected it as one of the Best Books of 2012. Tim was nominated for the 2017 Pushcart Prize for his short fiction, "Stolen Memories." His screenplays have won numerous international competitions. Tim is the founder of the Smith Prize for Political Theatre. He lives in France.

Radmila May was born in the U.S. but has lived in the U.K. since she was seven apart from seven years in The Hague. She read law at university but did not go into practice. Instead she worked for many years for a firm of law publishers and still does occasional work for them including taking part in a substantial revision and updating of her late husband’s legal practitioners’ work on Criminal Evidence published late 2015. She has also contributed short stories with a distinctly criminal flavour to two of the Oxford Stories anthologies published by Oxpens Press – a third story is to be published shortly in another Oxford Stories anthology – and is now concentrating on her own writing.

‘Surfeit of Suspects’ by George Bellairs

Published by the British Library Crime Classics,
10 April 2019.
ISBN: 978-0-7123-5238-3 (PB)

This book begins with a bang when a violent explosion destroys the offices of the Excelsior Joinery Company. When rescuers reach the scene, they discover three bodies in the wreckage of the building, who are identified as three of the five directors of the company. The next day, as soon as the forensic experts confirm that the explosion was not an accident, the local police call in Scotland Yard. Superintendent Littlejohn and Inspector Cromwell are assigned to the case and head to Surrey to investigate.

Littlejohn is confronted with a surfeit of suspects, plus several possible motives and a vast number of questions. What were the three company directors doing in the office at that time in the evening when the Managing Director, Fred Hoop, who was not present, insists that there was no meeting scheduled? Had Fred Hoop, with or without the connivance of his father, the Chairman of the company, deliberately attempted to destroy all the stock and other assets of the failing company in order to claim the insurance? Or was this explosion intended to murder one of the men and the others were collateral damage? Who, amongst the numerous suspects, was in a position to acquire dynamite and place it in the cellar of the building?

Littlejohn and Cromwell follow up clues in an exceptionally complex case and soon realise that, while there seems to be little reason for killing two of the victims, the same cannot be said for the third man, John Willie Dodd. There are motives for wishing Dodd dead related to both his personal life and his business dealings. He was forced to marry the daughter of a powerful local figure, Alderman Vintner, after he got her pregnant, but soon betrayed her with other women, and recently has been involved with Bella Hoop, the wife of Fred Hoop. Bella, a vain and shallow young woman, has left her husband and is staying with her long-suffering mother. The business reasons for wishing Dodd dead are even more compelling, as he has persuaded all of his co-directors to invest heavily in Excelsior and, when it fails, they will lose everything. Even the local bank manager, a man nearing retirement, is in a difficult position, having allowed loans to the firm which are unlikely to be repaid. At first, the case against the unprepossessing Fred Hoop seems very dark, with both personal and business motives for murdering Dodd, but Littlejohn is a detective with an instinct for corruption and he is determined to delve deeper into the secrets of the swiftly developing, industrial town.

Surfeit of Suspects is one of the books newly republished by the British Library and it is a pleasure to see Bellairs represented there. The plot deals with financial complexities, which Bellairs, whose day job was as a bank manager, manages to make clear and interesting. His characterisation is always vivid, with small, lively, cameo descriptions of the characters as they are introduced, and a narrative that is lightened by quiet, wry humour, as in the case of the unfortunate bank manager, George Frederick Handel Roper. Littlejohn is an appealing protagonist, honourable, hard-working, intelligent and kind to those in trouble, and his friendship with Cromwell works very well. Littlejohn is one of the almost forgotten detectives, who has his roots in the Golden Age, and deserves to be better remembered. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys high quality, traditional, 20th century police procedurals.
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Reviewer: Carol Westron

George Bellairs (1902-1982) a bank manager, a talented crime author, part time journalist and Francophile. His detective stories, written in the 1940s, 50s, 60s and 70s, combine wicked crimes and classic police procedurals, set in small British communities. Best known for his Detective Littlejohn stories, he is celebrated as one Britain’s crime classic greats.  Discover more about George Bellairs at his website

                            http://www.georgebellairs.com/

Article 

Carol Westron is a successful short story writer and a Creative Writing teacher.  She is the moderator for the cosy/historical crime panel, The Deadly Dames.  Her crime novels are set both in contemporary and Victorian times.  The Terminal Velocity of Cats the first in her Scene of Crimes novels, was published July 2013. Carol recently gave an interview to Mystery People. To read the interview click on the link below.

https://promotingcrime.blogspot.co.uk/2017/11/carol-westron.html

www.carolwestron.com

http://carolwestron.blogspot.co.uk/

To read a review of Carol latest book Strangers and Angels click on the title.

‘The Washington Decree’ by Jussi Adler-Olsen

Published by Quercus Editions Ltd,
8 August 2019.
ISBN: 978 1 52940 139 4 (PBO)

This stand-alone novel, that crosses the pond and is ably translated from the Danish language into English by Steve Schein, was first published in Denmark in 2006.  What the reader encounters is a rising politician who has suffered two horrifying history - repeats - itself bereavements. The brutal, fatal stabbing of Bruce Jansen’s first wife, Caroll, in China, which they were visiting when he was governor of Virginia, is still a festering wound when, 16 years later, his second wife, Mimi, pregnant with their first child, is gunned down on election night when he scores victory as the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate.

Despite the trauma, the grieving President is sworn in and assumes office and, vowing to end gun violence by whatever means, sheds his liberal tendencies and introduces autocratic iniatives that suspend Constitutional rights, censors the media, bars freedom of movement and generally abuses power. 

Dorothy “Doggie” Rogers, newly appointed to the White House, and Press Secretary Wesley Barefoot, reunite with their stalwart band of campaigners who’ve supported Jansen from way back, to make it their mission to stop what’s happening.   To make matters worse, it is Doggie’s right-wing Republican father who is identified as the evil mastermind in the murder of Mimi and now languishes on death row. 

The pace picks up, the reader rides a rollercoaster of twists and turns, the tension rises and in chapter 40, the reader becomes a fly on the wall listening to the true assailant’s conversation with his conspirators.

The author wraps up the story with his usual compositional skill and narrative rhythm; what is nerve-racking is the plausibility of something much like that spinning out of control in the US.  All in all, it’s an intriguing political thriller that’s certain to hook the author’s many fans.
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Reviewer: Serena Fairfax

Jussie Adler-Olsen was born Carl Valdemar Jussi Henry Adler-Olsen on 2 August 1950 in Copenhagen, Denmark.  He is a Danish author, publisher, editor and entrepreneur. Jussi Adler-Olsen's career is characterised by his great involvement in a wide range of media related activities.  

www.jussiadlerolsen.dk/ 

Serena Fairfax spent her childhood in India, qualified as a lawyer in England and practised in London for many years. She began writing by contributing feature articles to legal periodicals   then turned her hand to fiction. Having published nine novels all, bar one, hardwired with a romantic theme, she has also written short stories and accounts of her explorations off the beaten track that feature on her blog. A tenth, distinctly unromantic, novel is a work in progress. Thrillers, crime and mystery narratives, collecting old masks and singing are a few of her favourite things.

www.serenafairfax.com 

‘Music Macabre’ by Sarah Rayne

Published by Severn House,
30 August 2019.
ISBN: 978-0-7278-8896-9 (HB)

Phineas Fox was enjoying his new commission gathering background material for a biography on the life and loves of composer Franz Liszt, virtuoso composer-pianist.  His research has been going well until he turns up links to a music hall dancer Scaramel who during the late 1880 and 1890’s was notorious during her career for dancing on tables, at somewhere called Linklighters Supper Rooms in Harlequin Court, and that one of her admirers was Frans Liszt, albeit an aging admirer.  Further investigation reveal rumours that she had somehow become tangled in a murder, although the legend could not be verified.

While his is pondering on this new information in bounces Toby Tallis with whom he had recently co-authored a book Bawdy Ballads Down the Ages, which is doing rather well, and Toby has enthusiastic ideas for a second book. Toby is also cousin to Arabella who is ‘walking out’ with Phin, but unfortunately for Phin decamping to Paris for a month.  Resource to the Internet reveals that Harlequin Court and Linklighters still exists, the latter as a restaurant.  Toby instantly books a table and off they go to explore. 

Interspersed with Phin’s research into the period we meet Daisy, Scaramel’s maid in the 1880s, who tells the historical story and who along with her brother, nicknamed Link, becomes a target for a killer. Scaramel has an idea for women to warn each other of possible danger from the notorious Jack the Ripper, and it is here that we learn of the link to Liszt.  

Phin is keen to talk to the owner of Linklighters to see if any old papers still exist and so we meet Loretta, who is pursuing her own agenda.  He also discovers some sketches of the area and the era in a nearby bookshop but could Phin’s keenness to discover the truth behind the possible murder be Phin’s undoing.

I was fascinated by the clever blending of fact and fiction and the explanation of ‘Linklighters’ being street urchins carrying sticks with lighted tar to guide gentlemen and their ladies through the gloomy London fogs for a charge.  Also, the network of ghost rivers that run under London.

In the author’s notes at the end of the book she says Jack the Ripper got into the story in a far stronger way than she had bargained for.  Although, many people do, I personally have no fascination with Jack the Ripper.  I don’t waste time or thought on horrible people and he definitely falls into that category.  However, I love mysteries and this book falls clearly into that category.   I think it is brilliant and extremely clever and kept me guessing to the end. It also poses an intriguing hypothesis and I have no hesitation in heartily recommending it as a’ not to be missed read’.
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Reviewer: Lizzie Sirett 

Sarah Rayne's first novel was published in 1982, and for several years she juggled writing books with working in property, pounding an elderly typewriter into the small hours in order to meet deadlines.  Much of the inspiration for her dark psychological thrillers comes from the histories and atmospheres of old buildings, a fact that is strongly apparent in many of her settings - Mortmain House in A Dark Dividing, Twygrist Mill in Spider Light, and the Tarleton Theatre in Ghost Song. She has written more than 25 books to date, and her work has met with considerable acclaim. Her books are also published in America, as well as having been translated into German, Dutch, Russian and Turkish.  In 2011, she published the first of a series of ghost-themed books, featuring the Oxford don, Michael Flint, and the antiques dealer, Nell West, who made their debut in Property of a Lady. Several years ago Sarah also wrote six contemporary horror books, originally under the pen-name of Frances Gordon.

www.sarahrayne.co.uk
https://sarahrayneblog.wordpress.com/
www.facebook.com/SarahRayneAuthor
www.youtube.com/user/SarahRayneAuthor

‘A Hidden Life’ by Mia Emilie (The Watchers Trilogy)

Published by Mia Emilie,
19 August 2019.
ISBN 978-1-9161399-0-9 (PB)

This book concerns a fascinating, real life, unsolved historical mystery - the death in 1560 of Amy Dudley (some other sources call her Amy Robsart). We plunge into the story when Sir Samuel Banks, the Sheriff of Oxford, comes to see the body of Lady Dudley which is laid out in a cellar of Cumnor Place.  It is his job, firstly, to find a jury to ascertain the cause of death.    Sam hopes to hand the matter over to the Justice of the Peace, Reynard, but the man says he is ill and gives the investigation back to Sam.  Sam has been a royal spy and death doctor and his skills in these regards are valuable as he tries to discover the cause of the death of Amy Dudley and whether someone was responsible for her death.

The way lives are lived in the 16th century is beautifully shown; the ordinary folk suffer harsh conditions -  wearing no shoes, being dirty and being totally dependent on the masters for food and lodging of the rudest kind, while the men of the upper echelons have to travel by horseback considerable distances in foul weather and be prepared to fight those who attack or traduce them.   The political machinations within the Court and parts of society are dangerous waters for gentlemen to wade through.  Those who are embroiled in high level politics have to have a group of men to use in protection or to attack other people.   Sam’s ability in a fight is a very valuable attribute which he has to use fairly frequently. 

Mia really illustrates the totally different attitudes and circumstances of the 16th century to our own while showing our common humanity over relationships within and outside families.   Realism in her descriptions helps to get that period feel.  She provides details in passing that illuminate the Elizabethan era, for example,  Hugh, the Undersheriff wears his writing desk - that is he has hanging round his neck a container with parchment, ink and pen - all men carry daggers, and there is the job of rat catcher in large houses and Oxford Colleges.  Whatever your status in society there is common ground in the experiences of deaths of children - in this case from the pox.

This is a rollicking story - exciting and frightening incidents abound as Sam forges on in the hope of solving the central mystery of Amy Dudley’s death.

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Reviewer: Jennifer S. Palmer

This is Mia’s first book and it is the first of the Watchers trilogy which will consider Amy’s death as three investigators in different eras try to solve the mystery.

Mia Emilie lives in South West England with her family, rascally dog and a huge collection of books. Having studied creative writing from degree to PhD level, Mia was awarded her doctorate last year and is now a full-time crime writer. A Hidden Life, is her debut novel and the first instalment in, The Watchers, trilogy.  

www.miaemilie.com

Jennifer Palmer Throughout my reading life crime fiction has been a constant interest; I really enjoyed my 15 years as an expatriate in the Far East, the Netherlands & the USA but occasionally the solace of closing my door to the outside world and sitting reading was highly therapeutic. I now lecture to adults on historical topics including Famous Historical Mysteries.