Mini-Review: The Dark Enquiry by Deanna Raybourn

Partners now in marriage and in trade, Lady Julia and Nicholas Brisbane have finally returned from abroad to set up housekeeping in London. But merging their respective collections of gadgets, pets and servants leaves little room for the harried newlyweds themselves, let alone Brisbane's private enquiry business.

Among the more unlikely clients: Julia's very proper brother, Lord Bellmont, who swears Brisbane to secrecy about his case. Not about to be left out of anything concerning her beloved—if eccentric—family, spirited Julia soon picks up the trail of the investigation.

It leads to the exclusive Ghost Club, where the alluring Madame Séraphine holds evening séances…and not a few powerful gentlemen in thrall. From this eerie enclave unfolds a lurid tangle of dark deeds, whose tendrils crush reputations and throttle trust.

Shocked to find their investigation spun into salacious newspaper headlines, bristling at the tension it causes between them, the Brisbanes find they must unite or fall. For Bellmont's sakeâ € “ and moreâ € “ they'll face myriad dangers born of dark secrets, the kind men kill to keep….

The Dark Enquiry is the fifth book in the Lady Julia Grey series. First of all I’m not sure the title of the fifth book really reflects the content. I would have liked something more impactful. I absolutely LOVED this installment to the series. There is much protectiveness, tenderness and growth between Julia and Brisbane. Their marriage is put front and center, although Brisbane is still hiding many secrets. Julia has taken up a new hobby, or rather Brisbane has channeled Julia's energy into a hobby so he doesn't have to rescue her from getting into trouble all the time.

Even though the antagonist’s and their motivations can be worked out with some thought, there are still quite a few surprises. The part of the story with Julia confronting the antagonist is a bit too coincidental for my liking but this does not detract too much from the story as a whole. There is a particular sentence that struck me deeply, although I’m not going to give any backstory, as it may lean too much toward a spoiler, but I love the way Deanna Raybourn uses metaphors.

"I was wandering through a garden, a beautiful place, with the most exquisite blossoms. And as I put a hand to smell one, it closed, furling its petals tightly against me. I moved to the next flower, and it did the same, and it happened again and again until I reached the garden gate. I passed through and closed the gate, looking back to see the sea of blossoms, nodding sleepily on their stems. I locked the gate firmly behind me and walked on. I did not look back again."

Now you'll just have to read the story to understand what that quote means! I recommend reading the series in order...The Dark Inquiry is not really a standalone. Raybourn is working on a sixth instalment to the series.

My Rating: 5.0

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Mini-Review: Dark Road to Darjeeling by Deanna Raybourn

The fourth Lady Julia Grey mystery (following Silent on the Moor, 2009) finds Julia happily married to handsome, brooding detective Nicholas Brisbane. Their honeymoon is interrupted by her sister Portia and brother Plum, who want Julia and her new husband to come to India, where Portia’s former lover, Jane Cavendish, is living on the tea plantation her recently deceased husband, Freddie, inherited. Freddie died under mysterious circumstances, and Jane suspects he may have been murdered for his inheritance. Jane is pregnant, and she fears her child will be in danger if it proves to be a boy. Despite her husband’s objections, Julia decides to investigate Freddie’s murder, getting to know the potential suspects, including Freddie’s spinster aunt, his cousin Harry, several neighbors, and a mysterious man known as the White Rajah. As Julia closes in on the killer, she uncovers more than a few family secrets.

In this installment, I don’t feel that Julia or Brisbane advanced much as characters or in their marriage though there is still great chemistry in their exchanges. Many significant events happened with secondary characters, such as Jane, Portia and Plum and many new characters were introduced. There are the usual incidents of Julia’s curiosity getting her into trouble and Brisbane coming to the rescue. The setting of India gives an exotic underpinning and the cultural aspects were interesting. Somehow either because of the setting of India or maybe it was all the new characters, Dark Road to Darjeeling just did not work as well for me as the earlier instalments in the series. Raybourn does excellent character building though...maybe there was just too many extra characters for my personal tastes. The ending is a complete shocker and left me wanting more, so this series is still one of my favourites and I look forward to the next book.

The next instalment in the series, Book 5, is The Dark Enquiry. 

My Rating: 4.0

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Deeds of the Disturber by Elizabeth Peters

Can fear kill? There are those who believe so--but Amelia Peabody is skeptical. A respected Egyptologist and amateur sleuth, Amelia has foiled felonious schemes from Victoria's England to the Middle East. And she doubts that it was a Nineteenth-Dynasty mummy's curse that caused the death of a night watchman in the British Museum. The corpse was found sprawled in the mummy's shadow, a look of terror frozen on the guard's face. What--or who--killed the unfortunate man is a mystery that seems too intriguingly delicious for Amelia to pass up, especially now that she, her dashing archaeologist husband, Emerson, and their precocious son, Ramses, are back on Britain's shores. But a contemporary curse can be as lethal as one centuries old--and the foggy London thoroughfares can be as treacherous as the narrow, twisting alleyways of Cairo after dark--when a perpetrator of evil deeds sets his murderous sights on his relentless pursuer . . . Amelia Peabody

Deeds of the Disturber did not recommend itself to me as well as the previous novels in the series. The setting of this installment was London, not very exciting compared to the wonderfully described desert and Cairo scenes of Egypt in the past novels. Many of the secondary characters were just not likeable or very interesting. The continual overt battle of wills between Amelia and Emerson diluted the usual sparkling banter between them.  The story had fits of starts and sections that seemed to drag on.  I also guessed a crucial element of the story early on which ruined my enjoyment.

But I did learn another new word...ratiocinative!

In my opinion, events in Deeds of the Disturber did not advance the Amelia Peabody series significantly.  A good read but does not have the vibrancy of the earlier efforts in the series.

My Rating: 3.5

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The Perfect Poison by Amanda Quick (Jayne Ann Krentz)

Book 6 in the Arcane Society Series by Amanda Quick - Jayne Ann Krentz - Jayne Castle 

Plagued by rumors that she poisoned her fiancé, Lucinda Bromley manages to live on the fringes of polite society, tending her beloved plantsand occasionally consulting on a murder investigation. For the notorious botanist possesses a unique talent: She can detect almost any type of poison, especially ones that have their origins in the botanical kingdom.

But the death of a lord has shaken Lucinda to her core. At the murder scene, she picks up traces of a poison containing a very rare species of fern. So rare, in fact, that only one specimen exists in all of England and it was stolen from her conservatory just last month.

To keep her name out of the inquest and to find the murderer, Lucinda hires fellow Arcane Society member Caleb Jones who runs a psychical investigation agency. A descendant of the founder of the Society, Jones is very skillful at protecting its secretsand frighteningly good getting at the truth. Immediately, Lucinda senses both a raw power and an undeniable intensity in the imposing man.

But as a nearly overwhelming desire blooms between Caleb and Lucinda, they are drawn into the dark heart of a deadly conspiracy that can be traced to the early days of the Arcane Society and to a legacy of madness that could plunge Caleb into the depths of his own tortured soul. . . .

Am I going to give up on Jayne Ann Krentz?  Probably not, but I'm just not as satisfied with her writing as I used to be, although admittedly having collected over 130 books by Krentz I guess my expectations are biased.  Maybe my preferences have evolved or maybe I've just been exposed to too much great fiction and have higher standards now. The Perfect Poison's book jacket looks pretty and promising with purple flowers and ferns and a hot pink spine. The books feel nice and weighty, so I was excited to start reading, hoping The Perfect Poison would be the story that makes me fall in love all over again with Krentz. Well this novel will not be the one to make me do that...but neither will it make me give up her novels for good.  The 437 pages I thought an ideal size of read, but realized soon enough that the page count is deceptive and the read is much shorter and quicker than I was expecting. The type is a bit larger and the lines are quite spaced out and thicker paper is used, albeit the book is still priced at CAD$9.99.

Maybe its just the whole Arcane Society Series books that cross the paranormal (Castle), historical romance (Quick) and contemporary (Krentz) romance genres, which include the common storyline of the "Arcane Society" that is causing the problem for me...a lot of the language sounds repetitive, so the stories are not as fresh as they could be.  If The Perfect Poison is the first book you pick up by the author I think it would be a fun read, with a unique premise that the independent, strong-minded heroine Lucinda Bromley can detect plant energy, including poisons.  But the overly indulgent, flowery and flamboyant language made me cringe instead of chuckle this time. The hero Caleb Jones was not as much alpha as caveman really and his characterization could have done with more depth and polish. Overall: Average.

Recent January 2010 release in hardcover is Fired Up (Krentz); Next up is Burning Lamp (Quick) released in hardcover April 20, 2010; Midnight Crystal (Castle) released in paperback August 31, 2010.

My Rating: 3.0

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The Mummy Case by Elizabeth Peters

Radcliffe Emerson, the irascible husband of fellow archaeologist and Egyptologist Amelia Peabody, has earned the nickname "Father of Curses" -- and at Mazghunah he demonstrates why. Denied permission to dig at the pyramids of Dahshoor, he and Amelia are resigned to excavating mounds of rubble in the middle of nowhere. And there is nothing in this barren area worthy of their interest -- until an antiquities dealer is murdered in his own shop. A second sighting of a sinister stranger from the crime scene, a mysterious scrap of papyrus, and a missing mummy case have all whetted Amelia's curiosity. But when the Emersons start digging for answers in an ancient tomb, events take a darker and deadlier turn -- and there may be no surviving the very modern terrors their efforts reveal.

So I don't have much to say about the third book in the Amelia Peabody series. What was incredibly funny was the way Peabody talks about Emerson in the story as if he were a woman, with his fussing and hysterics and sensitivity of emotion and soft heart...yet outwardly of course he is blustery, always yelling and cursing, and quite manly.  I found the more in depth description of archeological methods and techniques informative and interesting, as well as the description of the various settings, especially the Cairo's bazaars.

Normally Peter's characters are likeable or interesting even though they may be responsible for evil-doing. In The Mummy Case I did not really care for some of the secondary characters, which impeded my enjoyment of the story.  There seemed to be too much going on in the plot as well, making events confusing. Actually I got irritated and finished the book as quickly as I could...I have now moved onto Lion in the Valley, the fourth book in the series.  Maybe I moved on to The Mummy Case too soon after The Curse of the Pharaohs but I don't think so as I have been liking Lion in the Valley so much more.

My Rating: 3.5

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The Curse of the Pharaohs by Elizabeth Peters

From the Back Cover:
Victorian gentlewoman Amelia Peabody Emerson does not relish the joys of home and hearth, For while she and her husband, the renowned archeologist Radcliffe Emerson , dutifully go about raising their young son. Ramses, Amelia dreams only of the dust and detritus of ancient civilizations. Providentially, a damsel in distress-demands their immediate presence is Egypt. The damsel is Lady Baskerville, and the site is a tomb in Luxor recently discovered by Sir Henry Baskerville, who promptly died under bizarre circumstances. Amelia and Radcliffe arrive to find the camp in disarray, terrified workers, an eccentric group of guests...and a persistent rumour of a ghost on the grounds. Now the indomitable Amelia must battle evil forces determined to stand between her and her beloved antiquities-and make her foray into the truth a most deadly affair...

Another delightful mystery, the second book in the Amelia Peabody series by Elizabeth Peters (aka Barbara Michaels, Barbara Mertz). The story is worth reading for the first chapter alone with the hilarity of Ramses Emerson's adventures and opinions, Amelia and Radcliffe Emerson's "catastrophically precocious" son. Despite Amelia's acerbic tone when describing Ramses, she has obvious pride in him though her mind yearns for Egyptian escapades. The author has a gift for creating very colourful secondary characters whether they are animals or ghosts, children or adults and gives each a distinctive voice and personality. I am looking forward to reading more about Ramses and the Egyptian cat that has adopted Peabody and Emerson as its owner.

I think the Amelia Peabody mysteries have captured me fully and I am well on the way to becoming obsessed with the series, like I already am by the Lady Emily Ashton series by Tasha Alexander and the Lady Julia Grey series by Deanna Raybourn, having purchased and already started reading The Mummy Case with The Lion in the Valley waiting in the wings. Very fitting as I believe Barbara Mertz pioneered the historical fiction mystery series featuring a strong female protagonist. No doubt I will end up reading the entire collection. So I highly recommend the the Amelia Peabody mysteries for those who like humor and wit with murder and mayhem in a historical context.

My Rating: 4.5

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Crocodile on the Sandbank by Elizabeth Peters

Elizabeth Peters' unforgettable heroine Amelia Peabody makes her first appearance in this clever mystery. Amelia receives a rather large inheritance and decides to use it for travel. On her way through Rome to Egypt, she meets Evelyn Barton-Forbes, a young woman abandoned by her lover and left with no means of support. Amelia promptly takes Evelyn under her wing, insisting that the young lady accompany her to Egypt, where Amelia plans to indulge her passion for Egyptology. When Evelyn becomes the target of an aborted kidnapping and the focus of a series of suspicious accidents and mysterious visitations, Amelia becomes convinced of a plot to harm her young friend. Like any self-respecting sleuth, Amelia sets out to discover who is behind it all.

Crocodile on the Sandbank is the first book in the Amelia Peabody Mystery series and although categorized as a mystery I think I smiled and chuckled all the way through. Amelia Peabody is such a character – a strong willed, opinionated, bossy woman, who thinks the only appeal she has is the inheritance left to her by her father. Touring Rome Amelia’s companion falls ill and must be sent home before they can reach their final destination of Cairo. She encounters a young Englishwoman, Evelyn Barton-Forbes, who has collapsed on the grounds of the Forum of Rome. After hearing Evelyn’s shocking story of betrayal and abandonment by a man she thought loved her, Amelia determines to takes Evelyn under her wing to mentor her and be her companion on her Egyptian adventures.

This novel is a mystery, a story of self-discovery and a bit of a comedy of errors. In the end Evelyn teaches Amelia more about life, loyalty and love than she ever expected. Beneath her prickly and spunky exterior Amelia hides a kind heart. The below quote is one of my favourites in the novel and portrays Amelia to a tee. “I watched them with the most thorough satisfaction I had ever felt in my life. I did not even wipe away the tears that rained down my face – although I began to think it was just as well Evelyn was leaving me. A few more weeks with her, and I should have turned into a rampageous sentimentalist.”

I’ve not delved too much into Egyptian archeological history so I’m not sure how true the methodology was for techniques in preserving Egyptian antiquities but I was impressed with the level of detail and how the descriptions of Cairo and Amarna come to life even though the story is fairly short. I’m sure I’ll continue on to read the rest of the series, the second book being The Curse of the Pharaohs. I would also recommend the Lady Emily Ashton series by Tasha Alexander.

Book Disclosure: Purchased  

My Rating: 4.5

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Silent on the Moor by Deanna Raybourn

Marcia at The Printed Page passed along her ARC copy of Silent on the Moor to me. Thank You! Despite his admonitions to stay away, Lady Julia arrives in Yorkshire to find Brisbane as remote and maddeningly attractive as ever. Cloistered together, they share the moldering house with the proud but impoverished remnants of an ancient family—the sort that keeps their bloodline pure and their secrets close. Lady Allenby and her daughters, dependent upon Brisbane and devastated by their fall in society, seem adrift on the moor winds, powerless to change their fortunes. But poison does not discriminate between classes…. A mystery unfolds from the rotten heart of Grimsgrave, one Lady Julia may have to solve alone, as Brisbane appears inextricably tangled in its heinous twists and turns. But blood will out, and before spring touches the craggy northern landscape, Lady Julia will have uncovered a Gypsy witch, a dark rider and a long-buried legacy of malevolence and evil. I’ve been having a difficult time getting motivated to write this review…I think mostly because I’m sad to see an end to the vibrant, charismatic characters of Lady Julia Grey and Nicholas Brisbane. The last installment of Deanna Raybourn’s Lady Julia Grey mystery novels, Silent on the Moor is a compelling and very, very satisfying denouement to the story of Lady Julia Grey and Nicholas Brisbane. Raybourn could have chosen to write a more straightforward story and I’m sure I would have been pleased but SOTM is so much more and I would venture to say the most complex out of the three novels. This novel has everything anyone would require for a great story…eccentric characters, multi-layered twisting plotlines, an evocative setting - mysterious and ancient mansion on the moor, historical detail, multiple secrets…and multiple deaths. Accompanying Julia to Grimsgrave is her sister Portia, her brother Valerious and their pets Florence, Puggy and Grim. After a tedious journey, Lady Julia hopes to be welcomed but their arrival falls quite short of expectations: Brisbane is temperamental and reticent, there are three poverty-stricken ladies in residence and the mansion is decrepit and full of secrets, with room after room empty - all except for a study full of dubious Egyptian artifacts. Lady Julia is determined to investigate why Brisbane gave up the reward of a gentleman’s title for the purchase of Grimsgrave, and as she unravels the mystery more questions arise. Lady Julia is finally coming into her own, determined to go after what she wants, Nicholas Brisbane. What I appreciate about Raybourn’s stories is that she creates relationships between characters and finds it unnecessary to go into explicit detail about their intimacy. Raybourn creates passion, tension, chemistry and yearning using dialogue, emotion and restrained expression not physical action. A true talent! A little longer than the previous two novels, in SOTM Raybourn stays true to her writing style and although each book stands on its own they form a cohesive whole…not always easy for authors writing series. I strongly recommend reading the novels in order, as there are storylines following back to the first novel, resolved in SOTM. For each chapter in each book there is a quote by bard summarizing the chapter (that must have been a lot of research), my favourite being the quote for the last chapter in Silent on the Moor…but you will have to read it to find out!

***Note I saw posted on Deanna Raybourn's blog that she plans on a fourth installment to the series.

My Rating: 4.5

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Silent in the Sanctuary by Deanna Raybourn

Silent in the Sanctuary…in one word, delightful! This second installment in the Lady Julia Grey novels by Deanna Raybourn takes a very gothic turn compared to the first book, Silent in the Grave, adding a dramatic element and keeping the storyline fresh. 

I’m not going to go into great detail about the novel…not wanting to spoil the story. After the murder of her husband and almost losing her own life in the subsequent investigation of the murder with private inquiry agent, Nicholas Brisbane, Lady Julia Grey is recovering in Italy with her brothers Plum and Lysander.  At the summons of their father, they return home to England for Christmas and the seat of the March family, the very gothic Bellmont Abbey. Accompanying them on the journey is the young Count Alessandro Fornacci, who has developed a passion for Julia but does Julia return the sentiment?  Her relationship with Brisbane complex and disturbing, Julia is not quite sure of her regard for him and in the four months she has been in Italy she has not heard one word from him…no sooner have the Marches arrived at the Abbey and Julia is introduced to Brisbane, now Lord Wargrave, and his fiancé Mrs. Charlotte King.  Of course then there is murder and Julia and Brisbane are thrown together again to investigate.  

There are not many characters I have encountered in novels that have the taut chemistry that Raybourn has created with Nicholas Brisbane and Lady Julia Grey…they are individuals in their own right and we get to learn many fascinating facets of their personalities. Raybourn as well has a talent for dialogue…varying at times biting, witty, playful, sarcastic, emotional, etc., each character having their own distinct voice.  

I am confused about the switching of formats and cover art between Silent in the Grave HC/MMP and Silent in the Sanctuary HC to the change in the MMP version. Now SITS MMP has a similar cover to the upcoming TP release of Silent on the Moor (March 1, 2009). I wish cover art for series books could be kept consistent…they look so much nicer on your shelves! I suppose the publisher is trying to attract romance fans but I don’t think the series can be classified as romance (yet), so why change the covers?  

You can find my review of Silent in the Grave here. This is a great series and next I will be reading Silent on the Moor, an ARC given to me by Marcia at The Printed Page.  If you like Victorian or Regency mysteries, I would also recommend Tasha Alexander’s Lady Emily Ashton series (And Only to Deceive, A Poisoned Season and A Fatal Waltz).  Try A Whisper in the Dark by Louise May Alcott and The Thirteen Tale by Diane Setterfield for gothic overtones.

My Rating: 4.5

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Silent in the Grave by Deanna Raybourn

It is Victorian England and we meet Lady Julia Grey as her ailing husband Edward is writhing in throes of agony upon their music room floor, guests to their gathering looking on. Of course he soon dies and inquiry agent Nicholas Brisbane requests an audience with Julia to tell her that her husband may not have died of his illness but may have been murdered…as he had been hired by Edward to look into threats against his life…but with no proof Julia sends him away. Now a year later, Julia finds a threatening note hidden at the very back of Edward’s desk drawer. Of course, she can’t let her husband’s murder lie at rest, so she seeks out Brisbane and hires him to again hunt out the perpetrator.

I thought Silent in the Grave a very well crafted, well paced story. I would describe it as snapshots of plot accompanied by descriptive labels (meaning each chapter’s matching quote by bard), rather than a running stream, teasing you a little bit here, a little there, before twisting again. The writing is very detailed and at times blunt, drawing you in, never letting you leave. The setting, Grey House, was intriguingly atmospheric…Edward preferring a much different style than Julia’s own muddled, quirky study…multiple varying occupants each with a secret.

I appreciated that Raybourn rounded out the setting and the characters, especially the March family. This is the first book in a series after all and I thought it important that Raybourn took the time to fully develop each character you are introduced to, making you feel intimately invested of the course each took in the plot. Lady Julia’s character being sparkling and adventuresome but both innocent and blind. Brisbane being hardened, secretive and complex. The banter between Lady Julia and Brisbane was often intense and at times witty or biting, making for an exciting story. I look forward to meeting them all again in Silent in the Sanctuary, the second in the series and Silent on the Moor, the third book in the series (to be released in trade format March 1).

Deanna Raybourn’s Silent in the Grave is an amazing debut novel, filled with puzzles, seething emotions and gothic romantic overtones. It has been one of my favourite reads in months and I put it equally on par with Tasha Alexander’s Lady Emily Ashton series, And Only to Deceive and A Poisoned Season (and A Fatal Waltz which I have not yet read), and Diane Setterfield’s The Thirteenth Tale.

My Rating: 4.5

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And Only to Deceive: A Novel of Suspense by Tasha Alexander

A delightful first novel of a series about Lady Emily Ashton set in Victorian England (Tasha Alexander).

Emily was only married to her husband for a short time before he died. After more than a year in mourning, Emily is learning surprising new details about the husband she never had the chance to know, and finds herself gripped by the same interest in antiquities he had. But some of the classical art pieces she examines are forgeries and someone doesn’t want her to discover more about her husband’s death...

Emily is a complex, daring and curious character. ‘And Only to Deceive’ is a great combination of historical fiction, suspense and lecture on classical art. A lot of the time suspense novels are predictable, as you know all the characters in the plot and can predict the antagonist but Tasha Alexander only gives you little snippets of detail for each character, carrying the suspense until the very last page. Great start to the series. Cannot wait to read ‘A Poisoned Season’ and then ‘A Fatal Waltz’.

My Rating: 4.0

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