Bestselling author Heather Redmond’s Death and the Visitors is the much anticipated sequel to her Mary Shelley Mystery series debut of Death and the Sisters. Now I eagerly await the third book in the series.
Once again, I loved getting to be a fly on the wall to the fictional goings on of the almost 17-year-old Frankenstein author, her months younger step-sister Jane (later known as Claire) Clairmont, acclaimed poet and Mary’s future husband Percy Bysshe Shelley.
This installment set in 1814, London where royals and diplomats have descended on the city after Napoleon’s death and in advance of the Congress of Vienna, finds the trio as they seek to find missing diamonds, solve two murders, and keep Mary’s father out of debtor’s prison.
As enthusiastic followers of Mary’s late philosopher mother Mary Wollstonecraft, members of the advance team of the Russian contingent, which included the mesmerizing Polish Princess Maria, her Russian husband and his brother, visited the family home above the bookshop.
After a lively discussion at dinner, the Russians pledged diamonds in support of Mary’s father William Godwin and stepmother’s publishing venture, the Juvenile Library. However noble the work, it was failing financially with creditors leaning hard for payment.
When Godwin, sans diamonds, learns a Russian was pulled from the Thames, Mary, Jane and Shelley must try to remove suspicion from the family and keep the moneylenders at bay.
While the light-fingered, favored daughter Jane is off at singing lessons, where she meets the romantic poet Lord Byron – the future father of her daughter, Mary’s cruel stepmother sent the cook to prison for taking a dress belonging to sister, Fanny, and had Mary play Cinderella of sorts toiling away in the kitchen.
Toss in a Scottish suitor for Mary, as well as her attempted human trafficking kidnapping, you’ll find a well rounded mystery with twists and turns that will keep you guessing, not to mention allusions to Mary’s thinking that would one day be part of her iconic work.
I highly recommend Death and the Visitors 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.
Click here to read my review of the first Mary Shelley mysteries, Death and the Sisters.
Review by Di Prokop, More Mystery Please
Order online or buy now at your favorite independent bookstore. Mine is Sellers Books and Art in Jim Thorpe, PA.
Once again, I loved getting to be a fly on the wall to the fictional goings on of the almost 17-year-old Frankenstein author, her months younger step-sister Jane (later known as Claire) Clairmont, acclaimed poet and Mary’s future husband Percy Bysshe Shelley.
This installment set in 1814, London where royals and diplomats have descended on the city after Napoleon’s death and in advance of the Congress of Vienna, finds the trio as they seek to find missing diamonds, solve two murders, and keep Mary’s father out of debtor’s prison.
As enthusiastic followers of Mary’s late philosopher mother Mary Wollstonecraft, members of the advance team of the Russian contingent, which included the mesmerizing Polish Princess Maria, her Russian husband and his brother, visited the family home above the bookshop.
After a lively discussion at dinner, the Russians pledged diamonds in support of Mary’s father William Godwin and stepmother’s publishing venture, the Juvenile Library. However noble the work, it was failing financially with creditors leaning hard for payment.
When Godwin, sans diamonds, learns a Russian was pulled from the Thames, Mary, Jane and Shelley must try to remove suspicion from the family and keep the moneylenders at bay.
While the light-fingered, favored daughter Jane is off at singing lessons, where she meets the romantic poet Lord Byron – the future father of her daughter, Mary’s cruel stepmother sent the cook to prison for taking a dress belonging to sister, Fanny, and had Mary play Cinderella of sorts toiling away in the kitchen.
Toss in a Scottish suitor for Mary, as well as her attempted human trafficking kidnapping, you’ll find a well rounded mystery with twists and turns that will keep you guessing, not to mention allusions to Mary’s thinking that would one day be part of her iconic work.
I highly recommend Death and the Visitors 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.
Click here to read my review of the first Mary Shelley mysteries, Death and the Sisters.
Review by Di Prokop, More Mystery Please
Order online or buy now at your favorite independent bookstore. Mine is Sellers Books and Art in Jim Thorpe, PA.
