The Ashes of London: The first book in the brilliant historical crime mystery series from the No. 1 Sunday Times bestselling author: Book 1 (James Marwood & Cat Lovett)

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This is terrific stuff: intelligent, engrossing and, in its evocation of a long-vanished London, wonderfully plausible. As the depredations increase in the occupied zone—food rationing, systematic looting, and the billeting of a German officer, Capt.

I enjoyed the setting and voices of the two main characters, but the story itself was rather slow and seemed to be lacking in some important parts. Marwood, the son of another old puritan, is a minor civil servant whose only desire is to live down his notorious name and make his way in the world. The Great Fire has destroyed the city from the Tower to the Temple, even its centrepiece, St Paul’s, succumbing to the flames. Heavner isn’t exactly mollified when Tempe, aided by retired police detective Skinny Slidell and a host of experts, puts a name to the dead man.

They explore different historical eras: Bleeding Heart Square, is set in the 1930s mainly in London (2008); The Anatomy of Ghosts (2010), set in eighteenth-century Cambridge; The Scent of Death, set in British New York, 1778–80; and its sequel, The Silent Boy (2014), during the French Revolution. He is the only author to have won the CWA's Historical Dagger three times, with The Office of the Dead, The American Boy and The Scent of Death. Our features are original articles from our print magazines (these will say where they were originally published) or original articles commissioned for this site. I'll bet that in the next book we'll get the sale of London's ashes to Russia so that building projects can move ahead. Marwood’s elderly father, Nathaniel, claims to have seen the body of a woman at Clifford’s Inn, where the court sits.

She joins the Resistance, volunteering for dangerous duty: shepherding downed Allied airmen across the Pyrenees to Spain. But he is not a victim of the blaze- there is a stab wound to his neck and his thumbs have been tied behind his back.The death of Russian asylum seeker Elena, ruled as accidental after a cursory investigation, seems the obvious choice, and Hulda – who faces a lonely future and is struggling to come to terms with personal tragedy – soon digs up new information that points to murder. The protaganists had a rather too modern outlook and view of the world, especially in their attitude to religion. The Financial Times and its journalism are subject to a self-regulation regime under the FT Editorial Code of Practice. There were a number of times that I wanted to query a character or the author but each time it was immediately followed by Taylor's explanation or justification. Dogged but prickly, and never having been “one of the boys” in any sense, she finds herself forced into early retirement.

There’s a delicious blend of real and imagined characters lending an authenticity that enhances the narrative still further and reading The Ashes of London is a bit like peeling back the layers of history and society so that the reader feels as if they were actually present. I felt the end was anti-climatic but that may just be my personal preference and always wanting a little more.Premium Digital includes access to our premier business column, Lex, as well as 15 curated newsletters covering key business themes with original, in-depth reporting. Cat and James are both living with their fathers’ treason against the crown and the constant fear that the clemency shown to them could be snatched away.