Victorian English Mystery

Facing court-martial for disobeying orders, Lieutenant Samuel Kingston despairs when avaricious aristocrats imprison his father for a crime born of Samuel’s clash with one of their own as a boy. The young Anglo-Irishman’s only hope of freeing both is accepting a commission assisting William Walker and his filibusters win Nicaragua’s bloody civil war.

Wimbledon, England, 1889. When Theodore Crozier is found dead the neighbourhood hopes the cause may be suicide, if only to spare further pain for both his dutiful wife, Laura, and beloved brother, Titus. However, there is more to the matter - a whisper of murder.... Inspector John Joseph Lintott of Scotland Yard is sent in to investigate, and the further he delves into the mystery the more tangled it becomes. Is Laura the pious, meek wife she appears to be? Could the rumours be true about her unnatural relationship with Titus? Was Theodore Crozier murdered by someone in his household?

Manchester, England, 1857. When the largest art exhibition ever to be held in Manchester opens, Rosanna Hawkins—one of Manchester’s finest artists to reproduce “parlor versions” of classic masterpieces with near-perfect precision—attends, excited by the chance to sketch such famous works. When she meets the handsome Detective Martin Harrison, who is head of security for the exhibition, she is immediately intrigued. But the couple’s blossoming summer romance takes a strange turn when Rosanna recognizes her own works on display in the exhibition hall.

Ninety-nine days remain in Isobel Amsel's sentence, and the world keeps spinning - just not for Isobel. Her twin brother disappears for unknown reasons, and she's left pacing in her cage like a tiger. While Isobel's rebellious adopted daughter, Sao Jin, keeps her on her toes, Riot is left to sort out his crumbling finances. And find a ring, which proves far more difficult than he imagined. With Isobel's release date closing in, Riot tries to sort out his life, his motivations, and his impending wedding, while Bel faces the question of what marriage and motherhood really mean.

Florida, 1884. It's a new year and Cassie Gwynne is determined to be done with the unseemly business of murder. Unfortunately, fate has other plans . . . The very next day, she happens upon the body of a newcomer to town—customs collector Chester Pence—floating beneath the boardwalk. Never one to shy away from a puzzle, Cassie can't resist getting involved in the investigation. It's no secret that Chester made a number of enemies in his short time in Fernandina: confiscating a beleaguered bride's wedding dress and a bossy businessman's cigars among many other mean acts.

Private investigator Charles Maddox is surprised when he is approached by Edward Tulkinghorn for help. The feared and shadowy attorney offers Charles a handsome price he can't refuse to do some sleuthing for a client. Charles learns that Sir Julius Cremorne has been receiving threatening letters, and now Tulkinghorn wants him to find and stop whoever is responsible. But what starts as a simple open-and-shut case swiftly escalates into something bigger and much darker. As he cascades toward a collision with powerful forces, Charles will need all the assistance he can get…

1876, Victorian London. Minnie Ward, the feisty scriptwriter for the Variety Palace Music Hall, is devastated when her best friend is found brutally murdered. She enlists the help of private detective Albert Easterbrook to help her find justice, even though he already has his hands full trying to catch the notorious Hairpin Killer. Together they navigate London, from its high-class clubs to its murky underbelly. But as the bodies pile up, Albert's burgeoning feelings for his amateur partner start to interfere.

The scion of a noble house brought low by a storm and the lady who nurses him back to health strive to unravel a web of deception that threatens her family and forces them to fight for what they hold most dear - family, each other, and love.

1850: Charles Dickens is in Manchester, performing at the Queen's Theatre with his acting group. But his career on the stage is cut short when a man is shot dead - on set. With Dickens himself caught with the gun in his hands, he is immediately arrested. Along with the help of his good friend Superintendent Sam Jones, Dickens must do all he can to find the real killer, before he is locked up for a crime he didn't commit. Can Dickens convince the authorities of his innocence? Will he unmask the true assassin?

Isobel Amsel is wasting away in an asylum. Mad with boredom, she recklessly risks her future wandering the countryside. When an excursion nearly turns deadly, Isobel fears one of her enemies is targeting her, but she quickly discovers something far more insidious. The lives of two boys are at stake, and she desperately wishes her partner were by her side.

In Bloody Lessons, it's the winter of 1880, and the teachers of San Francisco are under attack: their salaries slashed and their competency and morals questioned in a series of poison pen letters. Annie Fuller, the reluctant clairvoyant, has been called in to investigate by Nate Dawson, her lawyer beau. The case becomes personal when they discover that Laura, Nate's sister, may be one of the teachers targeted for attack.

It's the summer of 1880, and once again the lovely and inquisitive businesswoman Annie Fuller is helping San Francisco lawyer and beau Nate Dawson with a troublesome case. Nate's client, a female typesetter accused of murdering her boss, refuses to help in her own defense. Complicating matters, Nate's sister, Laura, insists on getting involved in the potentially dangerous investigation, while Laura's friend, Seth Timmons, troubled Civil War veteran, finds himself a witness for the prosecution. Will Nate be able to win his first big case?

British private investigator, Thomas Kincaid, thinks he's seen it all...until a gorgeous, soaking-wet American shows up and demands he help her find a stolen family heirloom. Having had his heart crushed once before by a beautiful woman, Kincaid has no intention of tempting fate a second time. But Joanna Thorncroft isn't about to take no for an answer. Joanna has to find her mother's ring and discover the secrets it contains. Secrets that have brought her all the way across the Atlantic and onto the doorstep of a sinfully handsome detective.

When not performing two sold-out shows every night, Music Hall Steampunk illusionists and consultants to Scotland Yard, slick-talking Michael Magister and the feisty Phoebe Le Breton, must solve the crime of the century, while saving the nation from a conclave of fiendish psychopaths led by the crazed renegade Jesuit known only as "The Black Bishop".

This gripping historical crime fiction novel, based on fact, is set in Bradford, England, 1888. It explores the horrific murder of Johnny Gill; a murder and mutilation so gruesome, it stuns a nation. Even hardened detectives are affected by its savagery, swiftly comparing it to the work of Jack the Ripper.

Living in Victorian London is difficult at the best of times. So, instead of following in his father’s footsteps, Albert decides on adventure. However, fate has other plans. One drunken night on his way home, he responds to the blood-curdling scream of a woman. He rushes her attacker and in the ensuing fight, he is bitten. Albert's world is changed forever. With that one savage bite, he is turned into a monster that people had believed was just a creation of an author's mind.

Civil war devastated the country and left Rachel Sawyer stranded in a dead-end job as a seamstress with no prospects for marriage. Men are thin on the ground in Massachusetts, so Rachel and her best friend travel west, to Seattle, with the handsome Talbot brothers. Jason Talbot, the eldest brother and wealthy owner of a lumber company, is so far beyond her reach that falling in love with him is the most non-sensical thing she could do. So, of course, she does. But after one sensual midnight encounter, Jason pushes her away.

Annie has a problem: She has a beautiful child, a loving husband, a well-run boardinghouse with a supportive circle of friends and family, but she’s feeling restless and unhappy. Dr. Charlotte Brown, the doctor who delivered Annie’s baby, has a different problem. The Pacific Dispensary for Women and Children, the clinic and hospital she co-founded, is being threatened by financial and legal difficulties caused by the mysterious illness of a former patient.

In Scholarly Pursuits, the sixth full-length book in the USA Today best-selling Victorian San Francisco mystery series, Locke explores life in University of California, Berkeley campus, in 1881. Laura and her friends face the remarkably modern problems of fraternity hazings, fraught romantic relationships, and fractious faculty politics.

It’s the summer of 1879, and Annie Fuller, a young San Francisco widow, is in trouble. Annie’s husband squandered her fortune before committing suicide five years earlier, and one of his creditors is now threatening to take the boardinghouse she owns to pay off a debt. Annie Fuller also possesses a secret. She supplements her income by giving domestic and business advice as Madam Sibyl, one of San Francisco’s most exclusive clairvoyants, and one of Madam Sibyl’s clients, Matthew Voss, has died.