Monday, March 8, 2010

Mailbox Monday 03.08.10



Hosted by The Printed Page.

Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their house last week (checked out library books don’t count, eBooks & audio books do). Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists.

Last time I posted that I got Cut to the Quick, book #1 in the Julian Kestrel mysteries by Kate Ross, set during the Regency. I have been dying to read this series for a long time. I got the other three books in the series last week! I can't wait to dive into them!


 A Broken Vessel

No detection team was ever more mismatched: Julian Kestrel, the debonair and elegant Regency dandy, and Sally Stokes, a bold and bewitching Cockney prostitute and thief. But one night Fate throws them together, giving them the only clue that can unmask a diabolical killer. It all starts in London's notorious Haymarket district, where Sally picks up three men one after the other and nicknames them Bristles, Blue Eyes, and Blinkers. From each of them Sally steals a handkerchief - and from one she mistakenly steals a letter that contains an urgent appeal for help as well. But which man did she get the letter from? Who is the distraught young woman who wrote it? And where is she being held against her will? These questions take on a new urgency when Sally finds the writer of the letter - dead. Luckily, Sally's brother is none other than Dipper, reformed pickpocket and now valet to gifted amateur sleuth Julian Kestrel. The authorities dismiss the girl's death as suicide, but to Kestrel it looks more like murder. To prove it, he must track down Bristles, Blue Eyes, and Blinkers, and find out which of them had the dead girl's letter. Sally uses all her ingenuity and daring to help Kestrel solve this case. But she is out to solve another mystery as well: Is there a man of flesh and blood under Kestrel's impeccable clothes?

Whom the Gods Love

Alexander Falkland hasn't an enemy in the world. Young, talented, charming, he shines in every field he enters: law, architecture, the investment market. But one night his luck runs out with a vengeance. In the midst of one of his famous parties, he is found in his study with his head smashed, a blood-stained poker beside him. No wonder the inscription on his gravestone reads: Who The Gods Love Die Young. When the Bow Street Runners fail to solve the crime, Alexander's distraught father turns to Julian Kestrel, elegant dandy and intrepid amateur sleuth.

The Devil in Music

On a mist-shrouded villa on Lake Como, an Italian nobleman is grooming a young English tenor for a career on the glittering operatic stage. But the enigmatic singer and his fiery mentor constantly clash. Before their sojourn is over, one will die by violence, and the other will disappear.
Enter Julian Kestrel, Regency dandy and amateur sleuth. Travelling in Italy with his ex-pickpocket valet, Dipper, and his friend, Dr. MacGregor, Kestrel is irresistibly drawn into this baffling murder case. Among the suspects are a runaway wife and her male soprano lover, a liberal nobleman at odds with Italy's Austrian overlords, a mocking Frenchman with perfect pitch, and a beautiful, clever woman who begins to haunt Kestrel's dreams. Soon Kestrel is caught between the shadowy Carbonari -- secret rebels against the Austrians -- and the equally ruthless Austrian-sponsored police. But at the heart of the mystery is the captivating tenor known only as Orfeo. Was he a political agent? A callous adventurer? A jealous lover?
These questions take on new urgency when the murderer strikes again. And as Kestrel uncovers the truth, he risks becoming the next victim."

 

3 comments:

Dazzling Mage said...

Oooh, great Kate Moss books!

Happy reading!

Passages to the Past said...

Those look good...looking forward to your reviews!

My mailbox is here.

Svea Love said...

Oh, The Devil in Music looks great!