Author: Alanna Knight
Genre: Crime, Mystery & Thriller
Format: E-book
ISBN: 9780749011611
Rights: World
Pub. Date: 12th January 2012
The year is 1860 and Inspector Faro has been transported back to one of the darkest moments of his career – the chase of the notorious Macheath across the Scottish border to the Kent countryside. Whilst there, Faro meets an old school friend, Erland Flett, who is working alongside the artist William Morris and the Pre-Raphaelites whose unconventional lifestyle is a startling revelation.
Erland is about to marry a beautiful but mysterious young lady, Lena Hamilton. Faro recognises her as the famous Madeleine Smith, accused of murdering her lover, but never convicted. Now Faro realises that he must apprehend Macheath and save his friend from certain death at the hands of the ruthless Miss Smith…and time is running out.
'House party murder mysteries are invariably entertaining... Ms Knight weaves in the historical characters of Morris, Rossetti and others with the real life "not proven" murderess Madeleine Smith to tell a fascinating and highly readable tale. We get to know a Faro we have not previously seen, one who's at the start of his career, adding a new dimension to a series that I thought had ended. This is a well-crafted story, with constant new developments in the case that keep the pages turning. In short, this is what I consider to be a real historical whodunit, one that has a firm underpinning of historical verisimilitude while concentrating 100% on delivering a rattling good yarn.'MyShelf.com
‘And where better to place a Victorian detective than the streets of 19th century Edinburgh, with its elegant society masking the city’s delinquent underbelly.’Liam Rudden, Edinburgh Evening News
‘The book is peppered with ‘real’ people – in this case, William Morris and his Pre-Raphaelite brotherhood, but they are portrayed as living, breathing people rather than historical caricatures...the crimes are complex, but the motivations for them are convincing – real and human – rather than puzzle-plot devices.’TheBookbag.co.uk