Tag: historical crime

Book Review – Viper in the Nest by Georgina Clarke @clarkegeorgina1 @Verve_Books

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Welcome to the final day of the blog tour for Viper in the Nest by Georgina Clarke, the third book in the Lizzie Hardwicke historical crime series. My thanks to Lisa at VERVE Books for inviting me to take part in the tour and for my review copy. Head over to Instagram, X or Bluesky to read the thoughts of the other readers taking part in the tour.

About the Book

London, June 1759. When a charmless civil servant takes his own life, few are interested in his death. But Lizzie Hardwicke, who plies her trade in the brothels of London whilst also working as an undercover sleuth for the magistrate, can see no reason why a man who had everything to look forward to would wish to end his life.

Lizzie’s search for answers takes her from the smoke-filled rooms of fashionable gambling houses, where politicians mix ambition with pleasure, to the violent streets of Soho, ready to erupt with riots in the sultry summer heat. All the while, she is navigating her complicated feelings for the magistrate’s trusted assistant, Will Davenport, and a disturbing situation at home.

Then a gambling house owner is brutally murdered, and Lizzie finds herself tangled in a chaos that she cannot control. The darkest of secrets threatens to turn Davenport against her forever; its exposure will send her to the gallows.

Format: Paperback (320 pages) Publisher: VERVE Books
Publication date: 24th April 2025 Genre: Historical Fiction, Crime

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My Review

I haven’t read either of the previous books in the series – Death and the Harlot and The Corpse Played Dead – which puts me in the perfect position to assure you Viper in the Nest can definitely be read as a standalone.

You can’t help but become engaged in the story from the start with the sudden and seemingly inexplicable suicide of a man who seemed to have everything. But was it all built on sand? Just how did a clerk working in a government office acquire the wealth to afford a large house and a mistress? As Lizzie observes, ‘Mr Merrick, the dullest man in London, was beginning to intrigue me.’

At one point a character says to Lizzie, ‘I think you’re like a terrier with a bone, agitating people until you find answers’ and there was never a truer word said because Lizzie can’t stop herself trying to find out the truth. She’s a brilliant character: resourceful, clever, witty and a loyal friend. She’s used to dissembling, pretending attraction where there is none. But her insatiable curiosity brings her dangerous enemies.

Always at the back of Lizzie’s mind are the circumstances that brought about such a change in her life and social status. She’s determined that will change one day but a new arrival at the Berwick Street brothel threatens her plans.

I liked the way the story demonstrated the divisions in society with many citizens of London living in abject poverty whilst the rich (mostly men) while away the hours gambling, whoring and seeking preferment in whatever way they can. The epitome of this excess is the bizarre personal bets, often involving thousands of pounds, placed on events such as what the weather will be on a particular day.

I enjoyed the simmering relationship between Lizzie and magistrate’s assistant, William Davenport. Despite signs of mutual attraction, Lizzie’s mindful that a harlot doesn’t make an ideal wife for a man in William’s position.

Viper in the Nest is a really entertaining historical mystery with a skilfully crafted plot and great period atmosphere. I hope there will be more adventures to come for Lizzie.

In three words: Engaging, suspenseful, colourful
Try something similar: Daughters of Night by Laura Shepherd-Robinson

About the Author

Georgina Clarke has a degree in theology and a PhD in history part-time, while working as a parish priest. Her love of the past is at the heart of her fiction: her Lizzie Hardwicke crime series is set in the mid-eighteenth century, and her standalone novel – The Dazzle of the Light – unfolds in 1920s London and is inspired by the real-life activities of the women-led Forty Elephants crime syndicate. Georgina is currently a tutor at the Queen’s Foundation in Birmingham. When she’s not working she enjoys dressmaking, running and mooching around old houses. She lives in Worcester with her husband, son and son, and two lively cats.

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Book Review – The Ghosts of Paris by Tara Moss @VERVE_Books

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About the Book

It’s 1947. The world continues to grapple with the fallout of WWII, and former war reporter Billie Walker is finding her feet as an investigator. When a wealthy client hires Billie and her assistant Sam to track down her missing husband, the trail leads Billie to London and Paris, where painful memories of her own husband’s disappearance also lurk.

As Billie’s search for her client’s husband takes her from the swanky bars of Paris’s Ritz hotel and to the dank basements of the infamous Paris morgue, she’ll need to keep her gun at the ready. Something even more terrible than a few old memories might be following her around the City of Light…

Format: Paperback (352 pages) Publisher: Verve Books
Publication date: 21st November 2024 Genre: Historical Fiction, Crime

Find The Ghosts of Paris on Goodreads

Purchase The Ghosts of Paris from Bookshop.org [Disclosure: If you buy books linked to our site, we may earn a commission from Bookshop.org, whose fees support independent bookshops]

My Review

The Ghosts of Paris is the second book in the author’s historical thriller series featuring Australian private enquiry agent Billie Walker. I definitely think it’s possible to enjoy The Ghosts of Paris without having read the first book, The War Widow, since the descriptions of the main characters and references to events in the previous book are sufficient to bring new readers up to date.

As in The War Widow, the legacy of the Second World War is never far away. Whether that’s physical scars, such as that of Billie’s assistant Sam, or continuing efforts to being Nazi war criminals to account. The terrible atrocities committed during the war, particularly on the population of Poland, are illustrated in the dramatic prologue.

Billie’s involvement in hunting down a criminal on the run has brought her notoriety and plenty of new clients, many of them women seeking evidence about errant husbands. Her latest client, Vera Montgomery, has a case that is a little too close to home, concerning as it does the unexplained disappearance of her husband Richard. That’s because the mystery of what happened to Billie’s husband, Jack, also remains unresolved. Can he still be alive having been missing for over two years or is he, as Billie has come to believe, dead?

The new case takes Billie and Sam to London and then Paris, a place Billie spent some time in during the war. There she is truly is surrounded by the ghosts of the past. More than she realises, as it happens. Their enquiries take them from the glamour of the Ritz hotel to the back streets of Montmartre. All the time, Billie can’t shake off the feeling that she’s being watched. But by whom and with what motive? She’s made plenty of enemies in her time, that’s for sure. Lucky then that she has her trusty pearl-handled Colt revolver tucked in her garter and loyal Sam at her side.

The standout scene in the book for me was Billie and Sam’s visit to the Paris morgue as they attempt to rule out the missing man’s disappearance is not the result of accident or foul play. It is utterly chilling.

All the different threads of the story are wrapped up pretty rapidly in the final chapters. But some things are left to be picked up in a future book, notably the changing relationship between Billie and Sam, and the lingering threat from those who still cling to Nazi ideology.

I could have done with a few less mentions of Billie applying her ‘Fighting Red’ lipstick, donning her sturdy Oxford shoes or exclaiming ‘Good Goddess’ but that’s probably just me. However, the twists and turns of the story, including a perilous encounter at Notre-Dame cathedral, and Billie’s tenacious pursuit of the truth kept me absorbed. I listened to the audiobook narrated by Corinne Davies who captured Billie’s feisty nature really well.

I received a review copy courtesy of Verve Books.

In three words: Intriguing, spirited, dramatic
Try something similar: The Comfort of Ghosts by Jacqueline Winspear

About the Author

Author Tara Moss

Tara Moss is an internationally bestselling author, passionate and inspiring chronic pain and disability advocate, human rights activist, documentary and podcast host and former model. Her crime novels have been published in nineteen countries and thirteen languages, and her memoir, The Fictional Woman, was a #1 international bestseller. Moss is a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador and has received the Edna Ryan Award for significant contributions to feminist debate and for speaking out on behalf of women and children. In 2017, she was recognised as one of the Global Top 50 Diversity Figures in Public Life. (Photo: Goodreads)

Connect with Tara
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