From the moment I heard about this book, I knew I had to read Heather Redmond’s Death and the Sisters, a Mary Shelley Mystery. (Yes, that Mary Shelley.) I’m so glad I did.

We first meet the 16-year-old future Frankenstein author and her also 16-year-old stepsister Jane after Mary trades a story in exchange for her 20-year-old half-sister Fanny’s hemming of her shift.  I was hooked.

The following evening Percy Bysshe Shelley comes to dinner in the family’s rooms above their bookshop across the street from Newgate Prison, where Mary’s father hopes to persuade Shelley to pledge his financial support to his publishing enterprise. While the sisters are all smitten with the dashing looks of the young, albeit married, radical poet, Mary appreciated his mind the most.  Mary Shelley, her sisters, Percy Bysshe Shelley and a bookshop…even better.

After their guest has left and the family has retired for the night, Mary heads down to the bookshop in search of research for a ghost story idea. There in the dark shop, she discovers an open door and a dead body just before Jane arrives on the scene. Mary Shelley, sister Jane, Percy Bysshe Shelley, a bookshop and murder. And that’s just in the first eighteen pages!

While this marks the trio’s first fictional adventure, in reality the three shared a lifetime of them together.
Heather Redmond, who has also written the Dickens of a Crime series, has done a phenomenal job dropping possible Frankenstein inspirations for Mary and interspersing lines from classic works throughout the captivating plot. This is the first in Redmond’s Mary Shelley series. I can’t wait to read the next one and will be sure to check out her Dickens, as well.

I highly recommend Death and the Sisters to mystery fans, historical mystery fans, poetry, science fiction and horror fans. I received this advance reader’s copy from Kensington Books, courtesy of NetGalley.

Order online or buy now at your favorite independent bookstore. Mine is Sellers Books and Art in Jim Thorpe, PA.