Historical Mysteries

Mary Jo Adamson
§ The Blazing Tree
Rennie Airth
§ The Blood-Dimmed Tide
Tasha Alexander
§ And Only to Deceive
Suzanne Arruda
§ Stalking Ivory
Cordelia Frances Biddle
§ The Conjurer
§ Deception's Daughter
Rhys Bowen
§ For the Love of Mike
§ Her Royal Spyness
§ In Dublin's Fair City
§ Murphy’s Law
§ Oh Danny Boy
§ A Royal Pain
Barbara Cleverly
§ The Damascened Blade
§ The Last Kashmiri Rose
§ The Palace Tiger
§ The Tomb of Zeus
Jeanne M. Dams
§ Crimson Snow
§ Silence is Golden
Kathy Lynn Emerson
§ Face Down Below the Banqueting House
Margaret Frazer
§ The Bastard’s Tale
§ The Hunter’s Tale
§ The Traitor's Tale
§ The Widow’s Tale
Alan Gordon
§ The Widow of Jerusalem
Ann Granger
§ The Companion
Kathryn Miller Haines
§ The War Against Miss Winter
Barbara Hambly
§ Wet Grave
C.S. Harris
§ What Angels Fear
Craig Holden
§ The Jazz Bird
Margit Liesche
§ Lipstick and Lies
Paul L. Moorcraft
§ Anchoress of Shere
Sharan Newman
§ Heresy
§ The Shanghai Tunnel
§ The Witch in the Well
Candace Robb
§ The Cross-Legged Knight
P.B. Ryan
§ Murder in a Mill Town
§ Still Life With Murder
Tom Rob Smith
§ Child 44
Daniel Stashower
§ The Beautiful Cigar Girl:
Mary Rogers, Edgar Allan Poe and The Invention of Murder
Kate Summerscale
§ The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher:
A Shocking Murder and the Undoing of a Great Victorian Detective
Andrew Taylor
§ An Unpardonable Crime
Jacqueline Winspear
§ Birds of a Feather
§ An Incomplete Revenge
§ Maisie Dobbs


The Last Kashmiri Rose, Barbara Cleverly, Dell, $6.99.

This is as exciting a first novel as Rennie Airth's sensational River of Darkness - though set in the past, it has an immediacy and robustness of plot that make it stand out in a crowded field of historical mysteries. The Last Kashmiri Rose is set in 1910 India, during the final years of the British Raj, and there's an uneasiness amongst the white military families. It seems one of the "Memsahibs" (white women) has been murdered every March for several years running. In fact the murders are so clever, it's not even certain they are murders, so just as he's about to leave India, Joe Sandilands of Scotland Yard is called practically off the boat home by no less a person than the Governor himself on the insistence of his niece. His niece being a passionate, determined and intelligent person, the Governor has paid attention to what she's been saying, especially as she could be one of the murdered memsahibs herself. Joe finds himself plunged into life on the British base - he's even given a horse, servants, and an honorary club membership - and some of it chafes. He's not used to being treated like a rajah, nor is he comfortable with the deference of Nauroung, the local man assigned to him by an apparently careless and insensitive British police chief. To me, this seemed slightly anachronistic, but on the whole it's not a serious deterrent to enjoying the rest of this wonderful book immensely.

Cleverly is not only adept at painting a wonderful picture of hot, exotic, beautiful India, but she's good at both plot and characterization, excellent qualities in a mystery writer. While this develops into a more or less standard serial killer story, the story surrounding this plot device is solid, and so is the background she's given it - she's even gone to the trouble of a memorable prologue set ten years before the murders - and pay attention to it, it's full of clues. She also provides a romantic interest for Joe, and it's a deliciously tormented and forbidden one, that stays just enough to the side not to turn this novel into a romance, rather than a mystery. Unlike the aforementioned Rennie Airth, Cleverly has a new novel coming out in October, so she won't be the one hit wonder that Airth is turning out to be. This is a terrific first book, and when Joe finally gets on the boat home at the end of the book, you as a reader are dying to go along.

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