Yet another of my Kindle deals – I love my Kindle cheapies. To a point. This one is a murder mystery, which I like. It takes place in 1666 in London, which I also like. Oh, and plague is breaking out. I don’t really like plague, but the black death has always been pretty interesting.
In this one, we’ve got Charlie Tuesday (the day he was put into the foundling hospital – no, seriously, that’s why). He’s a thief-taker, sort of a middle ages private investigator. He meets cute with Maria, who wants him to investigate her sister’s horrible violent murder. Oh, except that Maria really thinks that Charlie did it, and she traps him in the upstairs bedroom of her house with the corpse, and the cops on the way (not so cute). Charlie makes it out (no spoilers there) but has to find the killer to prove his innocence. The reason why Maria thinks Charlie is the killer is because a symbol was burned on her sister’s body that matches a key Charlie wears that is the only clue to his past.
The last person to see Maria’s sister alive was a plague doctor, wearing the standard uniform of a huge cloak and a beaked mask. So no one actually saw the killer’s face. And there are more murders, of course. Are they following some kind of ritual? And if so, what the hell kind of ritual is it? And this is taking place against the backdrop of the Restoration when the monarchy was still pretty shaky.
The solution of the crimes is pretty dumb – the who, the why, the wherefore – it’s just disappointing the way it’s wrapped up. But, the story moves along at a decent pace, there’s the usual “I love you, no I don’t” between Maria and Charlie, and just enough suspense to keep things going. Would I recommend? I’m not sure – I guess if I said anything about it, I would say that it didn’t suck, and if you don’t have anything else to read right now, you could do worse.
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