Historical

Darcie Wilde: The Heir

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Series debut

I’ve read many books by Darcie Wilde (aka Sarah Zettel), but this may be my favorite.  The writing and pacing are crisp and the character development seems to utilize all the things Wilde must have learned writing her other books.  It’s exquisite.  While this is a pretty familiar story to a history buff, like any good historical novelist, Wilde shines a new light on history, illuminating the facts with her perceptions of the characters in the story.

The main character, Queen Victoria – Princess Victoria at the time of this novel – is living under the “Kensington System,” an elaborate and restrictive set of rules that governed Victoria’s life until she became Queen.  She never had a moment alone, had to sleep in her mother’s room, and every movement and thought she had was determined by her mother and her mother’s aide, Sir John Conroy. The result in both fact and fiction was that Victoria wanted nothing more than to shed the rules imposed on her and to try and evade them. read more

Rhys Bowen: Mrs. Endicott’s Splendid Adventure

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Rhys Bowen’s annual standalone is a WWII novel about a woman who turns her life around after a surprising divorce and finds an unexpected new life in France just before the Nazis invade.

In 1938 Ellie Endicott is stunned when her husband of 30 years suddenly asks for a divorce because he is in love with another, younger woman. Ellie quickly gets advice from a solicitor and demands half their assets instead of the flat he offers her. Instead of taking this love-nest her husband once shared with his mistress, she demands a substantial settlement, then takes his Bentley and heads to France. read more

Jennifer Ashley: A Silence in Belgrave Square

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Below Stairs #8

I was entranced by book 7 in this series, Speculations in Sin, and am now a hard core fan.  If you are a fan of the late, great Victoria Thompson, this might also be the series for you.  Set in Victorian London, the main character, Kat Holloway, is a cook for a wealthy family.  While I have read many Victorian mysteries, this is the rare series that focuses on the servants rather than the aristocrats upstairs.  They are the minor characters, while the downstairs characters – cooks, maids, delivery men, urchin boys – are the main feature. read more

Sarah Stewart Taylor: Hunter’s Heart Ridge

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Franklin Warren and Alice Bellows #2

Hunter’s Heart Ridge is the second in Sarah Stewart Taylor’s Detective Frank Warren and Alice Bellows series, and it sees both of them returning with new challenges. Alice and Warren (no one seems to call him Frank) are neighbors, and have become good friends in the three months that have passed since the first book. Frank is still very much settling into his professional role, but he’s already become a fixture in this small community. He and his partner in crime solving, Pinky, are working well together, and he’s become familiar with everyone in town. Alice, on the other hand, is happy in her retirement and hosting a dinner party that includes Warren as a prominent guest. read more

Christina Dodd: Thus With a Kiss I Die

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Daughter of Montague #2

Thus With a Kiss I Die is the second in Christina Dodd’s Daughter of Montague series, and it loosely follows the plot of Hamlet, complete with a ghostly father. Our protagonist, Rosie Montague, is the eldest daughter of Romeo and Juliet – who the series suggests actually survived the events of that play. Rosie has a hoard of siblings, a strong personality, and a romantic dilemma. In the previous book, Rosie had intended to be caught canoodling with her true love, Lysander, so they would have to be wed. Unfortunately for the pair, the podesta of Verona intervened, and ended up in the dark with Rosie instead. read more

Lindsey Davis: There Will be Bodies

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Flavia Alba #13

Lindsey Davis’s latest addition to her Flavia Albia series is There Will Be Bodies. Flavia Albia is married to a Roman by the name of Tiberius, and is a dedicated Roman wife who learned her husband’s business. She helps him to keep things organized and running smoothly and profitably. However, she has her own profession on the side as well. Flavia has a knack for solving mysteries and getting answers for people, and thus she has made a bit of a name for herself. If anyone wants to know what happened to a missing cousin, or are worried the local authorities might not give them a fair investigation, they turn to her. read more

Laurie R. King: Knave of Diamonds

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Mary Russell #19

At Damian Adler’s wedding Mary Russell thinks she sees a familiar figure in the crowd, someone who looks like her uncle Jake. But Jake is dead, isn’t he? She last saw her wayward uncle 14 years ago and only remembers that the charming rogue was cast out of the family shortly before her parents and brother were killed in an auto accident.

As Mary looks forward to recovering from their adventures in the previous two books, Mycroft Holmes summons his brother Sherlock to London. The case? A cold case involving the theft of the so-called Irish Crown Jewels 14 years before: a case Holmes could not solve, a theft that cost him the wrath of the Dublin police and the King. That 14 years is no coincidence and Holmes immediately recalls the unproveable involvement of Jake Russell in the theft. Should he tell Mary the truth about her beloved (and apparently dead) uncle? read more

E.L. Johnson: Winter’s Crown

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The Winter Murders #2

Winter’s Crown, the second in E.L. Johnson’s historical mystery series picks up where the first book left off, directly after heroine Bronwyn saved Empress Maud’s life.* Despite her heroic act, however, Bronwyn’s life doesn’t change too much. She remains a cook, serving the empress with dwindling supplies in their ramshackle campsite. Separated from her family, as well as her friend Lady Alice and crush Rupert, Bronwyn is lonely and listless. She doesn’t even know for sure if her family is alive. read more

Kathleen Marple Kalb: A Fatal Waltz

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Ella Shane #5

A Fatal Waltz is the fifth book in Kathleen Marple Kalb’s wonderful series about opera singer Ella Shane, set in Gilded Age New York.  Ella, a mezzo-soprano who specializes in singing male roles, and is an expert swordswoman, grew up in a tenement.  She is the daughter of a Jewish mother and an Irish Catholic father, who both died when she was a child, and she practices both faiths, lighting Shabbat candles on Friday nights and going to Mass on Sundays.  After a famous opera singer took her under her wing, Ella went on to have a very successful career, and by now she has overcome the poverty of her childhood, but she has never forgotten it, or the people who were kind to her. read more

Nev March: The Silversmith’s Puzzle

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Captain Jim & Lady Diana #4

I loved, loved, loved the first book in this series, Murder in Old Bombay.  In that first book, the main characters, Captain Jim Agnihotri and Lady Diana Framji, meet and marry despite some pretty steep obstacles.  Jim is half white, half Indian, and he is not a Parsi, as Lady Diana is.  The Parsis, the aristocrats of Indian culture in the 1890’s, have very strict rules about marrying outside the faith. This creates problems for the couple.

Jim, a dashing and decorated Captain in the British army, has worked as a journalist and a private investigator for the Framji family.  He met the Framjis when he searched for the killer of Diana’s sister-in-law.  In this novel, it’s her widower, Diana’s brother Adi, who is in trouble.  The two novels in between this one and the first found Diana and Jim in Boston and Chicago and on a steamship crossing the ocean.  Those novels, which were fine traditional mysteries, nevertheless lacked the zip and life of the first novel.  As the Agnihotris return to India, however, life returns to this wonderful series. read more