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[[Category:New Reviews|Crime (Historical)]]{{adsense2}}__NOTOC__ <!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Bruce Macbain0571370977|title=The Bull Slayer|rating=5|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=Years after we left him in [[Roman Games (Plinius Secundus) by Bruce Macbain|Roman Games]], Pliny the Younger has become Roman Governor of Bithynia. Not the most hospitable of regions, its Greek residents regard the Romans with hatred; an emotion that, in many cases, is reciprocated by the Romans. No matter how bad this is though, it gets worse when a high ranking official dies mysteriously. Could it have anything to do with the religious sect of Mithras? Possibly but it's not Pliny's only dilemma; at home his beloved young wife Calpurnia is acting somewhat oddly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781850798</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewLock-Up|author=Frances Brody|title=Murder In The Afternoon: (Kate Shackleton Mysteries)John Banville|rating=4.5

|summary=Kate ShackletonIt's business as a private investigator six months since the dramatic events which we read about in [[April in Spain by John Banville|April in Spain]] and Dr Quirke is beginning to attract interest but when there's a loud banging on the door very early one morning she soon learns the truth of the old adage that when family comes now back inDublin and living (if somewhat uneasily) with his daughter, money doesn'tPhoebe. The visitor ''looks'' familiar but Kate can't quite place where she's seen the woman before. Eventually it emerges that Mary Jane Armstrong worst of his grief is Kate's sister. Kate was adopted as a baby and knew nothing of her natural family over but Mary Jane needs help. Her children had taken food he irrationally blames DI St John Strafford for their father at the quarry where he worked what happened and ten-year-old Harriet reported finding her father dead on this has made the floor of the hut, but already strained relationship between them more difficult. They're brought together by Chief Inspector Hackett when searchers returned to the quarry there was no sign body of a body or of Ethan Armstrong eitheryoung, Jewish scholar, Rosa Jacobs, is found in a lock-up. Local opinion said that her husband had abandoned themAt first, it looked as though she'd gassed herself but Mary Jane believed her daughterQuirke is convinced that it was murder rather than suicide.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749954876</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Elizabeth Loupas1529337968|title=The Second DuchessIn Place of Fear|author=Catriona McPherson

|summary=Elizabeth Loupas, it seems, was not It's July 1948 and Helen Crowther is due to start work as a qualified medical almoner the first author to be inspired by following morning - on the intrigue and scandal of day that the renaissance court of FerreraNHS is born. The poem She'My Last Duchess' by Robert Browning, first published ll be working for Dr Deuchar and Dr Strasser in 1842 is an elegiac account reflecting the popular view that Duke Alfonso d’Este murdered his first wife Lucrezia de Medici because of their GP surgery and her unfaithfulnessjob will be to help patients with those non-medical problems which affect their health. Loupas explores some The hardest part of the themes raised in job will be to persuade people that the poem services she offers really are free and cleverly combines elements that they don't have to do anything to qualify for them. Some of Browning’s work with true historical accounts to create an appealing murder-mystery set against the sumptuous backdrop problems will require delicate handling but Helen has a problem of renaissance Italyher own which might give her some insight. Her marriage has never been consummated.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848093837</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Frances Brody057136358X|title=A Medal for Murder: (Kate Shackleton Mysteries) April in Spain|author=John Banville|rating=4.5

|summary=When Terry Tice was a pawnbroker was unceremoniously robbed hitman, although he didn't think of valuable items which himself in those terms. He saw what he was holding on behalf did as ''a matter of clients he first called the police and then Kate Shackleton when the police seemed to be getting nowheremaking things tidy''. It wasnI couldn't just resist the crime thought that he was an extreme version of Marie Kondo. He enjoyed his job, something which had been committed, but the pledges had sentimental value occurred to many of Moony's clients and him when he was worried about how they would feel when in Burma with the jewellry couldnarmy ''t be returned where he got the chance to kill a lot of the little yellow fellows and what the impact would be on ''hishad a fine old time'' reputation. He wanted was spending a lot of time with Percy Antrobus - who couldn't understand why Terry didn't know the pieces back purpose of a swizzle stick - but most of all surely he wanted Kate Shackleton and her assistant Jim Sykes to visit wouldn't drink champagne with bubbles in the clients and discuss the situation with them. Simple''morning''? NoIt was after Percy's death that he saw the benefits of taking up a job in Spain.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749941928</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Frances BrodyB08Z8BMZ7H|title=Dying In The Wool: (Kate Shackleton Mysteries) Mystery of Healing|author=A P McGrath|rating=4.5

|summary=Kate Shackleton had gained something We meet Solon in Pergamon in the second century of a reputation for solving mysteries the common era and there were plenty of those he's the physician on duty at the end munus - the games put on for the amusement of the Great Warpopulace. She tracked down men who were then reunited with their families The remuneration isn't high but the work gives the doctor a feeling of virtue and even those who had no wish hones his skills: Solon ''wants'' the warriors to be found and were not reunitedlive. She had her own reasons for doing this - it made her feel more positive about her own situation. Her husband Gerald was posted It''missings quite a spectacle: the magistri are the charge hands and when we first see them, presumed deadthey're sprinkling gold dust onto the lions' in manes to make them look more impressive. The sagitarii are the archers and the last year of beastiarii are the war and it was condemned criminals who are going to fight for their lives with the one mystery she couldn't solve, no matter how she triedwild animals. But her successes in other areas led to her first professional investigationToday, it's the crocodiles.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0749941871</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stephen Gallagher1529337925|title=The Bedlam DetectiveMirror Dance (Dandy Gilver)|author=Catriona McPherson

|summary=Authors like It was the August Bank Holiday weekend and, as so often happened, it was cold enough to claim that writing is hard have the fire lit and Bunty the Dalmation wasn't inclined to leave it to keep Dandy Gilver warm on the sofa. The thought of workwas almost cheering when Dandy took the call from Sandy Bissett in Dundee. In She was the publisher of a way, that’s true – there are a really astonishing number magazine and had been told that the man running the Punch and Judy show in the local park had used copies of two of words in a book, her cartoon characters - Rosie Cheek and it’s often very difficult her sister Freckle - to wrangle them from your head into coherent sentences on a pagedrum up some local interest in his show. At the same time, though, Sandy Bissett''hard'' should not be the same as ''boring''. It’s sad s request was simple: she wanted Gilver and Osborne to come across authors who don’t enjoy warn the process man about infringement of writing, copyright - and Dandy and it’s so easy Alex would be cheaper than employing a solicitor to tell when you’re reading a piece of work by a writer who was actually having fun when they wrote itdo the same job.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091950120</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Edney SilvestreB08LKT7HSR|title=If I Close My Eyes NowMurder in the Belltower (A Miss Underhay Mystery)|author=Helena Dixon|rating=43.5

|summary=12th April 1961, In December 1933 the remains of Elowed Underhay were discovered in the cellar of the Glass Bottle Public House. Ezekiel Hamett was sought in connection with the radio news is full murder of Yuri Gagarin's first earth orbit Elowed and two boys who'd had ambitions to be Tarzanhis half-brother, to be engineersDenzil Hammett, or medical scientists curing all diseases, suddenly had a new possibility: maybe they could be astronautswhose body was also discovered. Kitty Underhay'Brasilia had been inaugurated less than a year earliers long search for her mother, but whichever of us got to be president who disappeared in June 1916 was going to transfer over. Now she's determined that the capital back man responsible for her murder will be brought to Rio. We were twelvejustice. It was a different country. A different world.'|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857521322</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Sax RohmerStephen Clarke|title=Fu-Manchu - Daughter of Fu-ManchuThe Spy Who Inspired Me

|genre=Crime (Historical)General Fiction|summary=Fu Manchu This is dead (or is he?) a spoof spy story, that isn't about James Bond. Or Ian Fleming. But it features a man called Ian Lemming, who dresses well and 'likes the ladies' and who works for the secret service, but his evil genius lives on, in the form of his daughter! New narrator Greville is sent to fetch Dr Petrie (narrator planning side of things more than the first three books) to come to an archaeological dig where Greville's chief Barton, an old friend of Petrie's, lies deadactive service. (Or does he?) From there Lemming finds himself put on a mission with a female spy called Margaux, and the pairend up stranded in Normandy, along with Nayland Smith Margaux on a desperate mission to unearth traitors in the resistance network, and Superintendent Weymouth, are plunged into a death-defying adventure.Lemming desperately trying to keep up with her!|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0857686062</amazonuk>2952163855

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=GK Chesterton0349423083|title=The Complete Father Brown StoriesDeath and the Brewery Queen (Kate Shackleton Mysteries)|author=Frances Brody

|summary=Having read many Kate Shackleton runs her investigation agency from Batswing Cottage, ably assisted by Jim Sykes, who lives in Woodhouse and her housekeeper, Mrs Sugden. She's been approached by William Lofthouse of the Father Brown short stories beforeBarleycorn Brewery in Masham. Something is going wrong with his business and he'd like Kate to look into it discreetly: he's hoping that his nephew and right-hand man, and after really enjoying the recent screen versionJames Lofthouse, I jumped at will be back from a trip to Germany before long. James went to see what the chance continental brewers were doing and what changes Barleycorn might need to get hold of this TV tie-in omnibusmake. The William is worried that James is perhaps enjoying himself a little cleric who has such bit ''too'' much or is going to bring back a mild manner, German bride but a keen knowledge of human evil, is one of my favourite detectives, and it was a pleasure he'd like the business to be able to read this complete collection of ship-shape before his storiesnephew returns.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849906467</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sara Sheridan0241433568|title=London Calling: a Mirabelle Bevan MysteryEight Detectives|author=Alex Pavesi

|summary=Mirabelle Bevan is an intriguing characterIt's 1930 and Megan and Henry are staying with Bunny at his house in Spain. Warm, resourceful It's unbearably hot and extremely clever, she spent her war years in intelligence (though not active duty) Bunny drank too much at lunch: he's going to have a rest and then, as the war ended and her long-time lover died, she withdrew he wants to talk to the coast Megan and the dubious joys of running a debt-collection agencyHenry about something serious. Accidentally getting involved in solving a major crime with her vibrant young companion Vesta Only it never gets her noticed, however, and it isnthat far: when Bunny doesn't long before she finds herself knee-deep in another mystery. A childhood friend flees London and an accusation of murder to beg Vesta and her employer to help him prove emerge after his siesta his innocenceguests find that he's been murdered. This leads How can that have happened? There's no one else in the intrepid pair into the world house, so one of smoky, music-filled basements and the black market, where they encounter criminals from all across them must be the social spectrumkiller.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846972434</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jacqueline Jacques1473682401|title=The Colours of CorruptionTurning Tide (Dandy Gilver)|author=Catriona McPherson

|summary=Mary, an impoverished cleaner, is witness Those who were with us at the end of [[A Step So Grave (Dandy Gilver) by Catriona McPherson|A Step So Grave]] will remember that Donald was engaged to a murderMallory Dunnoch. Archie They're now married and Mallory is having twins. When they arrive no one can doubt the charms of the first artists to work Lavinia Dahlia Cherry and her brother, Edward Hugh Lachlan Gilver. There are two drawbacks: they're noisy and they're staying with the police Dandy and creates a picture of the man she says she sawHugh. Taken by Dandy and her looks he persuades Mary detective partner, Alec Osborne, had not taken up the chance to sit for look into a portraitproblem at the Cramond ferry when it was offered to them twice before, but suddenly the man who buys possibility of being out of the portraitwould rather buy Mary herself..house at Gilverton seems irresistible.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906784531</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Andrew Taylor|title=The Scent of Death|rating=4.5|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=It’s hard to explain why Andrew Taylor’s novels are so chilling. They’re ghost stories that often lack ghosts, crime novels in which the crime itself feels at a remove from the rest of the action. But that’s really the secret of their power: while in most thrillers, the bogeyman is a single entity, easy to pinpoint Seishi Yokomizo and therefore easy to excise from the rest of the healthy fictional world, things are never so simple in the universes Taylor creates. What is frightening in an Andrew Taylor novel? Everything.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007213514</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=George Mann Louise Heal Kawai (Editortranslator)|title=Encounters of Sherlock Holmes|rating=4.5|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=Sherlock Holmes remains an enduring icon of English literature; perhaps as popular today as he was back in the late 1800s, maybe even more so with the advent of TV and film adaptations of his adventures. Indeed, such is the lasting appeal of the character that since the death of Conan Doyle there have been literally hundreds of works published, picking up where the original stories left off. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781160031</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Matthew Pearl|title=The TechnologistsHonjin Murders

|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=The year To many readers, the phrase 'locked room murder mystery' is 1868 and Boston is under threat from an evil genius who seems enough to have make the uncanny ability book one to manipulate matter itselfread; preferably quantified by the words 'clever' or 'good'. For those who need more, here is the extra background – we're in rural Japan in the 1930s. The city oldest son of an esteemed family is belatedly getting married, although the whole affair is really not as ostentatious as it might be – hardly anybody has already experienced two attacks; turned up, what with it being arranged at great haste. She only has an uncle representing her family, for one thing. Either way, the celebrations have gone ahead as planned, only for the chaos wedded couple to be slashed to death in their private annexe before the harbour when sun rises on their marriage. What with a man missing parts of his fingers being in the navigation instruments went awry neighbourhood, and some mysterious use of a traditional musical instrument at the eerie spectacle in time of the commercial quarter when every item crime, this case has a lot of glass, including windows, eyeglasses, clocks and watches spontaneously meltedthe peculiar about it. But are these attacks a prelude to something greater?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0099512769</amazonuk>1782275002

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=James P BlaylockB07XLM3SM6|title=The Aylesford SkullMurder at the Dolphin Hotel|author=Helena Dixon

|summary=Langdon St. IvesElowed Underhay was just twenty-seven when she disappeared from Dartmouth in June 1916, leaving her daughter, renowned scientist and adventurerKitty, returns home from in the hubbub care of her grandmother. A great deal of money had been spent to find out what happened to her and grime of Victorian London the conclusion was that she was dead, mainly because there was no evidence to suggest otherwise. Kitty has come to his tranquil residence terms with this and in rural Aylesford where he lives 1933 she was running the Dolphin Hotel in Dartmouth with his wife Alice her grandmother when her grandmother had to leave to look after her sister who was ill. She was reluctant to leave Kitty in charge - and their two young childrenKitty could not understand why. Weary She's always coped with the mix of holidaymakers, boating people and the city, having survived a devastating explosion naval college on the edge of town before - and she's done every job in the hotel. And she particularly vicious attempt cannot understand why her grandmother's friends have been roped in to keep an eye on his life, he is hoping for some repose things ''and a chance '' why Captain Matthew Bryant has been hired to work quietly on his latest project; a dirigible airshiptake charge of security at the hotel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857689797</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stephen Gallagher0349423067|title=The Kingdom of BonesBody on the Train (Kate Shackleton Mysteries)|author=Frances Brody|rating=4.5

|summary='If you like this sort of thing…' reads From Christmas to Easter a line train ran from Stephen GallagherLeeds City Station to King's 'The Kingdom of Bones'Cross, 'then here comes arriving before dawn so that the kind forced rhubarb it carried could be taken to Covent Garden. In early March 1929, one of thing you’ll like'. It’s describing the opening music for porters who was unloading the boxes discovered the body of a theatrical numberman, but it’s an almost perfect tagline for ''The Kingdom stripped naked and with no means of Bones'' itselfidentification. If you like Victorians, vaudeville Scotland Yard hit a dead end and villainy, if you like prize-fighting called on the services of Kate Shackleton in the hope that her knowledge and police chases and possession by connections in Yorkshire would give them the Devil, then here comes 'The Kingdom of Bones'lead they needed. It’s Kate immediately found herself hamstrung: Commander Woodhead remembered her as a child and could not come to terms with the kind of thing fact that you’re really going she was now a woman experienced in dealing with murder. He was reluctant to likegive her all the information which the police held.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091950139</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Dashiell Hammett1472127110|title=The Return of the Thin Man|rating=4|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=I've recently been discovering the original works of Raymond Chandler which, like many people, I'd only really known from the Hollywood renditions. A natural, if backwards, progression from there was clearly to the writer that Chandler called 'the ace performer', the man 'who did over and over again what only the best writers ever do at all'.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908800208</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewIndian Summer: a Mirabelle Bevan Mystery|author=Essie Fox|title=Elijah's MermaidSara Sheridan

|summary=Author Augustus Lamb receives a shocking letter from his publisher Life has changed dramatically for Mirabelle, our favourite fifties sleuth, since the war, and old friend Frederick Hallnot always for the better. Hall has discovered Lamb's small grandchildrenWhen she first settled in Brighton she was alone, Lily rudderless and Elijahsecretly grieving for Jack, in a London home for foundlings. Lamb's son Gabriel had the lover who died after a socially unacceptable liaison with beautiful Italian Isabella who subsequently disappearedbefore he could leave his wife. Delighted beyond words at Hall's discoveryAs time went by she found in herself an ability to solve crimes, Augustus adopts the twinsmade friends including an ebullient and determined young woman called Vesta who refused to let a little thing like racial prejudice stop her doing what she wanted, raising them and even found consolation in his Herefordshire country home, Kingsland House. There the children grow, happy and lovedarms of a rather charming policeman.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409123340</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=James Carnac1912374439|title=The Autobiography of Jack the RipperCourier|author=Kjell Ola Dahl and Don Bartlett (translator)

|summary=The ''Autobiography'' presents itself as the Ripper’s story told from his own perspective. The son of an impoverished doctorNazi-occupied Oslo, young Carnac has a childhood obsession with blood which a series of unfortunate events morphs into a full-blown desire to slit human throats1942. It’s the typical Victorian coming-of-age story (from birthThere, to school, then first love and finally adulthood) with a twist, in that I've given the path Carnac’s on leads him to become not a responsible adult but the most famous murderer of the nineteenth centurygame away.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552165395</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Kylie Fitzpatrick|title=The Silver Thread|rating=4.5|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=It's 1840 and Rhia Mahoney, daughter of an Irish merchant specialising For in local linen, has a comfortable life. All book that changescentres around a murder, however, as her fatherI's warehouse burns down, taking his faltering business with ve told you who did it, ensuring Rhia must make her own way in – the world. Via family connections she comes to England and the home of Quaker widow Antonia Blake. The idea is that Antonia will protect Rhia whilst she seeks a position as governess in bustlingNazis, alien London. But rather than residing in a sanctuarysurely? Well, her problems worsen as she's enveloped in a mystery leading to transportation despite her innocence. The only things holding her life together are the letters she writes that certainly has to her dearly departed grandmother, her artistic skill and a determination to discover who wants her gone.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908800127</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Martin Davies|title=The Year After|rating=5|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=Captain Tom Allen is home from World War I. Whilst waiting remain to be demobbed, he receives an invitation to attend the annual Christmas house-party at Hannesford Court, the stately home of Sir Robert and Lady Stansbury. He used to look forward to it before joining up and so decides to attend again, but everything has changed. The Stansbury's heir, Harry, and son-seen in-lawthis volume, Oliver, were killed and second son, Reggie Stansbury, remains in a nursing home with no legs and dwindling self-respect. Whilst coming to terms with the devastating realisation that he's which splits its time between one of the very few men in their set to return alive and entirewar, Tom remembers pre-war Hannesford and the night when his friend Professor Schmidt died at such a gathering. Everyone believes it was unsuspicious but gradually things are coming to light that hint of hidden secrets. Along with young woman sees her Ladyship's former companionfather arrested, Anne (who has issues of her own), Tom decides to investigate and their store condemned as truths are exhumed, making him doubt whether those happier times were as idyllic as he remembers.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0340980443</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Karen Engelmann|title=The Stockholm Octavo|rating=4|genre=Historical Fiction|summary=As a Customs Jewish and Excise 'Sekretaire' in 18th century Stockholm, Emil Larsson has all he needs: professional respect, a bachelor's lifestyle and a table at Mrs Sparrow's gaming house whenever he fancies his luck. Contrastingly, his superiors at work feel he's missing a certain something. In order rushes to climb further up the career ladder (maybe even her best friend to maintain his current position) Emil needs to marry. His manager believes this so fervently that there's a deadline for the wedding. Emil panics but Mrs Sparrow offers to lay an 'Octavo', a fortune-telling spread of eight cards to guide him to the eight people who help – not knowing she will ensure his success. Howevernever see her alive again, not all goes to plan as, over and the eight nights it takes to complete the Octavolate 1960s, it becomes apparent that the prediction isn't for Emil's future, but has become an Octavo to save the whole of Swedenwhen great consternation is being felt.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1444742698</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Bruce Macbain|title=Roman Games (Plinius Secundus)|rating=4|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=Sextus Ingentius Verpa isn't the most popular person in Rome. He may be a high ranking politician with the Emperor Domitian's ear but In this also means he's timeline, a spy, ambitious and not always using his power and position for good. When Verpa maverick agent is discovered, unceremoniously and repeatedly stabbed back in his well-guarded bedroomtown, there are many one who sigh with relief. Howevermight have been fingered for murdering that female victim, the murderer must still be found even though she and so Domitian appoints Gaius Plinius Secundus (or Pliny the Younger he lived together with their baby as history will dub him) to investigate. Pliny isn't a natural but reluctantly takes on the task because Domitian says so; Pliny has no choice. Domitian also says that the culprit must be found before the end of the Roman Gamesyoung family, giving Pliny 15 days. Over these 15 pressurised days except he'll dig into Rome's filthy underbelly of cults, prostitution and other things he wasn't expecting, including practically adopting his own, personal rude poet.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908800364</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Maureen Jennings|title=Vices of My Blood: Murdoch Mysteries|rating=4.5|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=William Murdoch has at last been promoted was thought by all to full detective, and continues to solve cases with his usual mix of dogged determination and flair. Toronto at have died in the end of the nineteenth century is marked by a huge divide between the rich and the poor, and the fact that many of the latter group are utterly destitute leads to all manner of crimes, great and small.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857689924</amazonuk>War…

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John Kerr1786075431|title=Fell the AngelsMrs Mohr Goes Missing|author=Maryla Szymiczkova and Antonia Lloyd-Jones (translator)

|summary=Cecilia had had more surnames than was usual for Meet Zofia. A socially climbing wife of a medical professor, she's intent on making herself known as a young woman in the late nineteenth centurycharitable lady, and keen on her husband progressing yet through his esteemed career. She was born Henderson In 1890s Cracow, life is pretty good, but married Robert Castello and quickly came to realise that he was an adulterer with a drink problemshe knows it could always be better. A womanMeanwhile, other people's place was thought life could certainly be better – cholera is nearing the city due to be with her husband - even by Cecilia's wealthy parents - but they recognised that forcing her lack of hygiene, and many people have to go back fall on charity and almshouses to him could be problematicalkeep a roof over their heads. As a compromise One such was Mrs Mohr, although she was sent rich enough to Malvern to take a water cure keep private lodgings and it staff in her charitable home. I say ''was there that '', for she came into contact with Dr James Gullyhas vanished. He was a good deal older than Cecilia but a relationship developed between the two - affection on CeciliaOnly due to Zofia's part (probably the most of which help does she was capable) get found, dead and love on hisin a place the near-lame woman could never reach by herself.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709098383</amazonuk> Just who could be killing people in a charity home, and to what end? And why does Zofia feel the need to make a name for herself by answering those questions?

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Graeme Kent1786893762|title=One BloodThings in Jars|author=Jess Kidd

|summary=Sergeant Kella A child has gone missing. The detective asked to take on the case is being sent from his native Malaita to still struggling with the shame and frustration left by a previous case, where the child was not found in time. Hardly original themes for a private eye thriller. And yet . . . take another part of the Solomon Islands to investigate logging sabotage therelook. In This detective is a woman, and the same districtsetting is Victorian London, his friend Sister Conchita has assumed reluctant control with all the rich and colourful paradoxes of that era: technical and scientific progress jostling for space beside superstition and a mission fascination with three elderly sisters living there who are rather set the bizarre and the downright hideous. And before you're more than a couple of pages in their ways, to say the leastyou realise just how much more unusual our heroine is than you expected. Then Bridie Devine may dress in half-mourning, with a body turns up widow's cap and stout, shiny boots, but the tobacco she smokes in the church… her pipe (my dear, what an utterly ''fast'' thing for a lady to do!) is this related mixed with a nugget of something, well, let's say recreational, created by her chemist friend Prudhoe. The fact that it's actually meant to cure bronchial problems is by the sabotage? by. Her housemaid, being seven-foot-tall, is also somewhat remarkable. And how does the wartime history then, of John F Kennedycourse, vying to become there's the new President of ghost. Ruby Doyle, world-famous tattooed boxer (deceased) accompanies Bridie all through her investigation, and it's clear he has a soft spot for the USAdetermined young woman. If he really exists, fit in to all of this?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849013411</amazonuk>that is.

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=David Long0349414327|title=Murders of London: In the steps A Snapshot of the capital's killers |rating=4|genre=Crime Murder (HistoricalKate Shackleton Mysteries)|summary=While the true crime specialist reader may prefer books which deal in one case in depth, there’s always room for another title at the other end of the spectrum, dealing in brief with a variety of murders over the years.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847946720</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Shirley McKay|title=Time and TideFrances Brody

|summary=A ship is wrecked on Even detectives need a break and for Kate Shackleton, photography gives her the mental relaxation which she needs. When the coast of 16th century Scotlandlocal Photographic Society proposed an outing, Kate was keen to take the crew goneopportunity to visit Haworth and Stanbury, not least because the only man on board dying deeds of the Brontë Parsonage are being handed over so that it can become a museum and a windmill lashed to its deckher parents will be there for the event. What happened? What sort of illness does it carry? Andcould be better than seeing her family, more importantly for witnessing a momentous event and having the town's people, who gets opportunity to keep take photographs of the windmillsetting for ''Wuthering Heights''? It's a tough one, but university professor and erstwhile lawyer Hew Cullan is on the caseNothing could go wrong.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846972183</amazonuk> Or could it?

{{newreview|author=Daniel Stashower|title=The Harry Houdini Mysteries: The Dime Museum Murders|rating=4|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=There are two things you need Move on to know about Stashower's Harry Houdini. Firstly, he is a huge fan of Sherlock Holmes. Secondly, and much more importantly, he is utterly certain of his own ability to do whatever he sets his mind to. Therefore, when he finds himself involved, albeit in a minor way, in a murder, he immediately decides it is up to him to solve the case. It never occurs to him that he might fail, because that is simply not an option for the Great Houdini.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857682849</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Maureen Jennings|title=Let Loose the Dogs: Murdoch Mysteries|rating=4.5|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=The fourth book in the series of mysteries which star Detective William Murdoch is set, like the others, in Toronto. Religion, money and family rule this late-Victorian city just as they do back 'home' in England, and Murdoch's struggles for truth and justice, not to mention his love life, are played out against the sense of guilt and the moral restrictions imposed upon him by his Catholic faith.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857689908</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Maureen Jennings|title=Under the Dragon's Tail: Murdoch Mysteries|rating=4|genre=Crime (Historical)|summary=Murdoch is a lonely man, still grieving for the fiancée who died over a year before. He busies himself, when he is not working, with training for the police sports' day, learning to dance, and trying to overcome his attraction to the charming lady who lodges in the next-door room. She is a charming young widow with a young son, but since she is not Catholic, he knows, sadly, that he can never find married bliss with her. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857689886</amazonuk>}}[[Newest Dyslexia Friendly Reviews]]