Historical

Thriller writer Andrew Gross has turned his sights to a topic closer to him personally, the Holocaust. While I almost feel I have read, seen and learned everything about the Holocaust, this book provides a fresh look at this hellish time in human history and reminds us that as humans we are capable of devastating cruelty. The balance Gross brings to his novel – a balance between storytelling and what is obviously deeply felt history – is really very well handled. I could not put this book down nor could I stop thinking about it. read more

I haven’t picked up a Barbara Cleverly novel in a couple years, despite being a huge fan of the earlier books in this series, which are set in India during the British Raj. Her central character, Joe Sandilands, has since made his way back through Europe and is now back home in London working for Scotland Yard. But enough time had elapsed for me not to compare the books set in India to this one, which is set in Oxford in 1933.

Cleverly has always been a bravura plotter and storyteller; she has twists upon twists and it makes a reader breathless to try and keep up with her facile brain. The opening scene in this novel is a knockout – a young female doctor, bicycling home, is drawn on All Hallows Eve to explore a sinister looking church on the edge of the University campus. She’d been intrigued by a sign she’d seen; but instead of finding some kind of weird cult at work, she finds a dying young man in one of the pews who confesses to his own suicide with his last breath. She’s a doctor so she does her best to save or at least comfort him, and she’s shaken by his death. read more

Candace Robb returns with a new series set in 1399 York, featuring a true badass, Kate Clifford. Kate has a rich backstory, fleshed out throughout the book while she veers from crisis to crisis. She’s a widow who moved to York from Scotland for safety’s sake, but as York at that time was a hotbed of political intrigue, nowhere is really safe. She’s lost her twin brother who “talks” to her (kind of like Hamish in Charles Todd’s Ian Rutledge books) and she’s looking after two wards, her dead husband’s bastards, now bereft of their mother. It’s an uneasy alliance. read more

The opening of Susanna Calkins’ new book is a real knockout – her central character, Lucy Campion, stumbles across what she thinks is a ghost rising out of London’s stinky, scary River Fleet as she makes her way home. The year is 1667 and Lucy is relieved to find the apparition is a woman, not a ghost, but the woman is weak, confused, and covered in welts and cuts. She takes her to the the nearest doctor.

As Lucy and the doctor’s irritated maid take the woman’s clothes off and give her something clean to put on, they notice the clothing is high quality and that the woman’s hands are soft, making her a probable member of the upper classes. For this reason the doctor decides to take her in, and his wife decides to lend the woman some of her old clothes. read more

The excellent fourth installment in Sam Thomas’ Lady Bridget Hodgson series finds Lady Bridget bored at her country estate, where she’s fled with her deputy, Martha, and her adopted daughter, Elizabeth. The quiet is disrupted when she receives a message that her nephew Will (and Martha’s fiancée) is at the Tower of London and would they please come? They set out for London at once, eventually making their way to the Tower where they discover an unharmed Will but a demand from Cromwell’s head spy that they work undercover for him. read more

This is a terrific entry in Tasha Alexander’s fabulously entertaining Lady Emily series. In this outing, Lady Emily and her husband are in Cannes for the insanely extravagant celebration of their long time friend Jeremy’s engagement to an American heiress, Amity. As Alexander fills in the reader’s knowledge of Amity by going back in time to India where Amity and her friend Christobel met Jeremy’s brother Jack (and later Jeremy), it seems destiny that the beautiful Amity will become the future Duchess of Bainbridge. read more

Lady of Ashes is the first in a historical mystery series featuring Violet Morgan, an undertaker in Victorian London. I found myself drawn into Violet’s world from the first pages, and the story held my interest to the end, despite the fact that this isn’t a straightforward mystery.

We know early on there has been a murder as the prologue contains a brief diary confession. But the book immediately shifts to Violet’s home and work lives. Excerpts from the diary appear throughout the book, reminding us about the murderer, long before Violet—or anyone else—has a suspicion that a murder has occurred. read more

Anna Lee Huber’s fourth novel featuring Lady Darby, a well known portrait painter and widowed wife of an anatomist, finds our Kiera awaiting the outcome of her sister’s pregnancy, engaged, and of course stumbling over a dead body in the third chapter. Huber, as a writer, really knows how to keep things humming, and I enjoyed this book thoroughly from start to finish. Huber is deft with a good mix of romance, mystery and history, and through her two major characters, Kiera and her fiancé Sebastian Gage, she supplies a good back and forth dynamic to her storytelling. read more

This isn’t really a mystery but it has a secret at its core, and any reader who enjoys writers like Tasha Alexander and Anna Lee Huber, who include romance in their novels, will enjoy this one. Willig writes what I would call romantic adventure stories – stories, no matter what the category, that are impossible to put down or forget.

Unlike, I think, any of Willig’s other books, this book is set entirely in the past, without an accompanying present day story line. She’s chosen the 1920’s, and she’s created a character who absolutely lives and breathes; you’ll be rooting for her, you’ll be heartbroken for her; you’re with her every step of the way. I think I’ve just described Willig’s two most salient attributes as a writer: she tells a great story, and she creates unforgettable characters. read more

These books have slowly been picking up steam and are a wonderful reading counterpart to Sam Thomas’ midwife series. Set in mid 1600’s London – where author Calkins can dig into such juicy topics as the plague and the Great Fire (see In the Charred Remains), this novel finds former chambermaid Lucy Campion working as a bookseller and printer’s apprentice, something she’s been able to do because of the massive loss of lives during the previously mentioned events. While not common for a woman at the time, it wasn’t unknown, and Calkins runs with it. read more