England Expects
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4.0 • 2 Ratings
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
Dangers abound in 1950s Brighton as former Secret Service operative Mirabelle Bevan cuts to the chase to solve multiple murders . . .
When sportswriter Joey Gillingham stops off at a Brighton barbershop for a shave and a trim, he gets more than he bargained for—a slashed throat. The journalist's next headline story in the paper is his obituary.
With the ghastly murder the talk of the seaside town, Mirabelle and her close friend and coworker Vesta Churchill find themselves irresistibly drawn to the case. Rumors of the newspaperman being a member of the freemasons lead the ladies to the group’s local lodge, where they happen upon a cleaning lady in the throes of poisoning. Are the two deaths related? The common thread seems to connect to the secret society.
Despite being warned off by Superintendent McGregor, the fearless friends continue to investigate, breaking into an abandoned royal residence in Brighton and following a trail of clues to a Cambridge college and bizarre masonic rituals.
To beard the lion in his own den, Mirabelle and Vesta will need to walk the razor's edge—but with desperate characters and more bodies turning up, it's going to be a close shave . . .
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
London journalist Joey Gillingham says he's in Brighton to cover a boxing match, but he's actually heading for a meeting on a career-changing scoop, in Sheridan's strained third mystery set in 1950s England (after 2017's London Calling). When Gillingham ends up with his throat slashed, debt collector Mirabelle Bevan is intrigued by the unusually bold crime. Slipshod treatment of the body by the police, many of whom are Freemasons, convinces her that the secretive brotherhood is covering something up and after Gillingham's coded journal goes missing, Det. Supt. Alan McGregor, Mirabelle's secret admirer, is inclined to agree. When Mirabelle and her business partner, Vesta Churchill, talk their way into the Masonic lodge, they witness its charlady die of poisoning. A visit to the derelict Brighton Pavilion, where the dead woman also worked, produces new puzzles. The Masons remain generic villains beneath their exotic trappings, and the investigation relies too much on unfounded surmise, coincidence, and confession. Hopefully, Sheridan, who has a gift for evoking the era's class, racial, and social tensions, will return to form next time.)
