Tag: victorian

BAD BLOOD by Marilyn Todd

Marilyn Todd is the author of the Julia McAllister Victorian Mystery series: historical murder mysteries with a courageous woman sleuth embarking on traditional British private investigations in nineteenth-century London.

The case of the Lindbergh baby is infamous. In March 1932, he was snatched from his nursery, a ransom note left in his place, and although the money was paid, two agonising months passed without news. It was pure chance that his body was found, thrown or dumped just off the highway, suggesting he was killed almost immediately after his abduction.

I don’t know if it was because Charles Lindbergh was famous — the first man to fly solo across the Atlantic — but it struck me that all the sympathy for this horrific crime went to the father, rather than both parents. I desperately wanted to change that.

In Bad Blood — the third book in the Julia McAllister series — baby Thomas Forbes is also snatched from his nursery, and a ransom demand is left on the pillow. The difference here is that the money is never collected, and the baby never found. When, eight years later, his father is murdered, Julia’s heart breaks for the woman brought to her knees by these two tragedies. As an amateur sleuth, Julia determines to do whatever it takes to find Thomas.

But as I plotted the novel, I was drawn into other injustices of the era. Not just the social inequalities — class, race and religious divides feature regularly in my books — but also the impact of being a pawn in the marriage game among the powerful and the wealthy. I wanted to explore the misery that comes from being a strong woman trapped in a weak man’s world.

 

Click here to pre-order BAD BLOOD

Click here to learn more about the Julia McAllister Victorian Mystery Series

Sapere Books Signs a New Tudor Novel and a New Victorian Novel by Alexandra Walsh

We are delighted to announce that we have signed up the fourth instalment of Alexandra Walsh’s captivating Marquess House Series – dual timeline conspiracy thrillers with ingenious twists on Tudor and Stuart history – as well as the next novel in her new Victorian series.

In Alexandra’s words:

“It’s wonderful to have signed with Sapere Books to continue writing about my favourite eras: Victorian and Tudor. THE MUSIC MAKERS tells the tale of another branch of the family tree established in THE WIND CHIME (the first novel in my new Victorian series). THE MUSIC MAKERS follows two timelines: one set in the Victorian era and one set in the present day. The Victorian timeline follows the life of Esme Blood, a singer and performer in the music halls and theatres of London. Adopted at birth, Esme has no desire to find her birth mother, but fate has other plans. In the present day, Eleanor Wilder is recovering from a serious illness and has returned to the family farm in Pembrokeshire to rebuild her life. Delving into Esme’s life, she uncovers a tale of love, loss and survival, all of which help her to unravel her own problems and those of the man who has unexpectedly arrived in her life.

“My other forthcoming book, THE JANE SEYMOUR CONSPIRACY, is a return to Marquess House. Although I had always intended this series to be a trilogy, when I completed it in 2020 it felt as though there was more to tell. I resisted for a while but when Perdita, Piper and Kit began interrupting my research with suggestions, I realised my trilogy was about to expand. Having always pitched it as three-book series, I was unsure how Sapere Books would feel about it continuing, but my editor, Amy Durant, said she would be delighted to return to Marquess House.

“THE JANE SEYMOUR CONSPIRACY follows Perdita and Piper as they fully embrace their lives at Marquess House. A friend of Kit’s asks for advice on a manuscript that has been in his family’s archive for generations, which seems to suggest an entirely new interpretation of the events leading up to Anne Boleyn’s execution, Jane Seymour’s marriage to Henry VIII and the death of the king’s only acknowledged illegitimate son, Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond and Somerset. In the present, danger reaches out to Perdita and Piper again as they realise their battle with the Connors family is far from over. THE JANE SEYMOUR CONSPIRACY will be released in 2022.

“Being part of the Sapere Books family is one of the best things about being published; Amy, Caoimhe, Richard, Natalie, Matilda and Helen make everyone feel so welcome and are a dynamic and forward-thinking team. My books could not be in safer hands. The weekly Zoom meet-ups with the other authors are fascinating, funny, inspiring and often educational! It’s a great feeling to be part of such a talented group of writers and publishers who are always willing to help or offer advice.”

 

Click here to find out more about The Marquess House Series

Click here to pre-order THE WIND CHIME

His Father’s Ghost by Linda Stratmann

Linda Stratmann is the author of the MINA SCARLETTI INVESTIGATIONS, a traditional British detective series set in Victorian Brighton.

More than a year ago, I determined to write a book in which Mina Scarletti, disabled by the scoliosis that twists her spine and cramps her lungs, is taken ill and solves a mystery while confined to bed. It is not a new concept. In The Wench is Dead, Inspector Morse solves a Victorian murder while in hospital, and in Josephine Tey’s The Daughter of Time, Inspector Alan Grant, hospitalised with a broken leg, explores the fate of the Princes in the Tower.

But these are historical puzzles, and therefore considered suitable to engage the mind of a bored invalid. In His Father’s Ghost, Mina has additional challenges. She is intrigued by a current conundrum, the disappearance of a local man while out sailing, declared legally dead, but his actual fate unknown. Her doctor, however, has advised her against any activity that might tax her delicate health, and that includes solving mysteries. She has to use all her ingenuity to gather the information she needs. In doing so, she finds that she has uncovered evidence of past crimes and scandals. Her enquiries are a catalyst that set off a train of events that ultimately have dramatic and life-changing consequences for several prominent citizens of Brighton.

One of the themes which I explore in this book is hallucination. Mina, when stricken by a fever, sees and hears things that reveal what is troubling her. The son of the vanished man, disturbed by significant events, has terrifying visions in those dark hours that lie between sleeping and waking.

I really enjoyed my research for this book. I visited the fascinating Police Cells Museum of Brighton, and read about the curious spiritoscope, an apparatus designed to prove that it was spirits and not the medium who cause the movement of the divination table.

It was my real pleasure to include two characters who have appeared in previous books, the flamboyant actor Marcus Merridew, fresh from his acclaimed season as Hamlet, and the creepy young photographer Mr Beckler.

While editing the manuscript, which was completed at the end of 2019, I was struck by how Mina’s plight echoes our current time. She is ill with a lung infection, and effectively on lockdown. But when she scents a puzzle, it gives her strength. She needs not only warmth and air and nourishment, but material to keep her busy mind alive.

 

Click here to pre-order HIS FATHER’S GHOST