‘Shadow of the Axe’ by Peter Tonkin

Published by Sharpe Books,
4 November 2021.
ISBN: 979-8488-52649-5 (PB)

It is 1599 and seven horsemen recently returned from fighting in Ireland, among them Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, are galloping from London to see the Queen at Nonsuch Palace.

Meanwhile a Thomas Grey warns Robert Cecil, Secretary of State at Nonsuch about the Earl’s approach. He calls for his Intelligencer, Robert Poley who when told is suspicious that Essex plans to take the throne for himself. When he arrives the Earl is covered in mud but in his hurry he rushes to see the Queen.

Realising that her majesty is not yet dressed for the day, Poley lets Essex rush in to see her knowing that she will exact punishment on him for finding her in disarray. Essex is aghast to see this old hag surrounded by women. Too late he realises who she is. He is arrested and caged in York House.

So begins Cecil’s plans to infiltrate Poley into the Essex household, not only to find out all he can, but somehow bring about the Earl’s downfall, together with his followers. He is in a very precarious position though because the Earl’s own spies know of Poley’s close association with Robert Cecil. He has to be especially wary of the Bacon brothers, Sir Anthony and Sir Francis.

Poley however, has a fellow spy in the Essex household, a Lady Janet Percy, and thanks to her just manages to avoid his own death. However, one of Essex’s men, a Gelly Meyrick is determined to get rid of him somehow.

Meanwhile, the Queen allows Essex to return to his house but he is confined within. He mistakenly thinks he can raise the people up to support him against Cecil. He sincerely believes her counsellors are plotting to remove her and place the Infanta of Spain on the throne.  Little does he realise what a dreadful fate awaits him and how he misjudged the populace.

A really absorbing book full of treachery and treason with one faction plotting against the Earl of Essex and another against Robert Cecil.

Peter Tonkin is a master at getting down to the real nitty gritty of intriguing history and bringing it alive. I thoroughly recommend Shadow of The Axe for readers interested in Elizabethan times. I found it absorbing.
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Reviewer: Tricia Chappell

Peter Tonkin was born 1 January 1950 in Ulster, son of an RAF officer. He spent much of his youth travelling the world from one posting to another. He went to school at Portora Royal, Enniskillen and Palmer's, Grays. He sang, acted, and published poetry, winning the Jan Palac Memorial Prize in 1968. He studied English with Seamus Heaney at Queen's Belfast. His first novel, Killer, was published in 1978. His work has included the acclaimed "Mariner" series that have been critically compared with the best of Alistair MacLean, Desmond Bagley and Hammond Innes. He has also written a series of Elizabethan mysteries. Since retiring from teaching he has written mysteries set in Ancient Rome and more recently a series set in Greece.

https://petertonkin.com/

Tricia Chappell. I have a great love of books and reading, especially crime and thrillers. I play the occasional game of golf (when I am not reading). My great love is cruising especially to far flung places, when there are long days at sea for plenty more reading! I am really enjoying reviewing books and have found lots of great new authors. 

‘Anything For Her’ by G. J. Minett

Published by Zaffre Publishing.
22 March 2018.
ISBN: 978-1-78576-388-5 (PB)

We first meet our hero, Billy Orr in August 2015. He is travelling to Rye to see his older sister Mia whom, unbeknown to him, has a brain tumour that is likely to kill her in the near future.  We then go back to June 2002 when, aged eleven, Billy discovers both his parents dead in bed, having killed themselves in a suicide pact. His mother was terminally ill so he understands her wanting to die, but he has never understood, nor forgiven, his father for choosing to leave him.

Thereafter the story veers backward and forwards between 2002 and 2015. Mia is about ten years older than Billy and she and her husband Matthew have taken the now mentally challenged Billy into their home until he was old enough to fend for himself.  Billy loves Mia, but he and Matthew aren’t too keen on each other.

Back to 2015. Matthew picks Billy up from Rye station, takes him home to Mia and then proceeds to vanish – including to New York - for several days. Mia and Billy go shopping in a supermarket where Billy bumps into Aimi. When he was fifteen, she was the love of his life, but then she went off to London and despite promises to keep in touch, never contacted him again. He has loved and dreamed about her ever since.  After Aimi has convinced Billy that her husband is abusing her, Billy agrees to help her stage her own death on the understanding that, once things calm down, she will send for him and they can be together.

Mia dies and several months later, in 2016, Billy is still waiting to be sent for.  Talks with Aimi’s husband and father-in-law raise doubts in Billy’s mind about Aimi’s intentions.  With the aid of his IT savvy business partners, Billy tracks Aimi to Peaks Island in Maine. What he finds there forces him to address several difficult questions.  Had Aimi really been going to send for him, or for another lover, or for her husband? What was her plan?  Can she continue to play games with everybody?

Having lost his parents and his sister, can Billy cope with yet more potential loss and betrayal? Will he have to, or will he find his own solution?  Besides being a deceptively clever psychological thriller, Anything For Her is a very poignant story about love and loss. You will have to read the book to discover which of the two possibilities triumphs.
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Reviewer Angela Crowther

Graham Minett studied Languages at Churchill College, Cambridge before teaching for several years in Gloucestershire and West Sussex. In 2008 he completed a part-time MA in Creative Writing at the University of Chichester and subsequently won both the inaugural Segora short story competition in 2008 and the Chapter One competition in 2010. The latter consisted of the opening sections of what would eventually become his debut novel, The Hidden Legacy. This was followed by Lie In Wait and Anything For Her and his fourth novel, The Syndicate, is scheduled for publication in July 2020. Now writing full-time, he is published by Bonnier Zaffre and represented by Lisa Moylett of Coombs Moylett Maclean Literary Agency. He lives in West Sussex with his wife and children.

https://gjminett.com/

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.