The hangman's secret

Simply pursuing her unusual occupations private detective and crime-scene photographer creates a slew of problems for Sarah Bain. It's 1890, and Victorian London is unprepared for women in the workplace, let alone at crime scenes. Keeping secrets from her fiancé, a police officer, along with her choice of partners in detection, a street urchin and a gay aristocrat, creates further awkwardness. The biggest problem, however, is her involvement in solving the hanging death of the local hangman and pub owner, Harry Warbrick. No professional hangman would bungle a hanging and decapitate himself, so Sarah and her minions (and the police) set off to find his killer. A link between Warbrick and his most famous hanging, that of baby killer Amelia Carlisle, provides a puzzling clue. With delectably gruesome details, rapid-fire dialogue, an unpredictable plot, and well-developed characters, this top-notch third installment (following A Mortal Likeness, 2018) is sure to please fans of Carol McCleary's Nellie Bly and Rhys Bowen's Molly Murphy. Or, to put it another way, think Phryne Fisher meets Constance Kopp in Anne Perry's London.--Jen Baker Copyright 2018 Booklist

Rowland finally hits her stride in her third mystery featuring photographer Sarah Bain (after 2018's A Mortal Likeness). In 1890, Sarah is working for a tabloid, the Daily World, along with her two partners in investigation, Hugh Staunton, a lord, and Mick O'Reilly, a 14-year-old former street urchin. At her boss's request, the trio visit the London pub where Harry Warbrick, a retired hangman and the pub's owner, apparently hanged himself. Certain irregularities at the scene suggest foul play. Warbrick kept the ropes from his most famous executions, but the one he used on convicted baby killer Amelia Carlisle, "who took in unwanted babies for a fee and supposedly farmed them out to adoptive parents or raised them herself," has disappeared. The investigators' search for a motive for Warbrick's murder leads to a reexamination of the Carlisle case and the ruffling of some powerful feathers. The plotting and characters are an improvement over the prior two books, even if not at the level of Rowland's best work in her Sano Ichiro series. Agent: Pam Ahearn, Pam Ahearn Agency. (Jan.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

A Victorian sleuth's probe of a suspicious suicide leads to a deeper mystery surrounding a notorious serial killer.London, 1890. Photographer Sarah Bain's success as an amateur sleuth (A Mortal Likeness, 2018, etc.) has led to a job as a crime-scene photographer for the Daily World. Together with her handsome sidekick, Lord Hugh Staunton, and street urchin and factotum Mick O'Reilly, Sarah's summoned to a grisly scene. Pub owner and sometime hangman Harry Warbrick appears to have hanged himself. His severed head rests in a noose above a pool of blood. But evidence at the scene convinces Sarah that this was not suicide but murder. Malcolm Cross, Sarah's rival at the World, mocks her account. In announcing an in-house contest to ferret out the truth before the police, Sir Gerald Mariner, the paper's shrewd owner, pits Sarah against Cross (not to mention law enforcement). An interview with the not-so-grieving widow reveals that she's taken a secret lover, whom Sarah unmasks on a visit to Newgate prison as handsome prison surgeon Dr. Simon Davies. The investigative trio has visited Newgate in response to the discovery that a rope Warbrick had on display in his pub has been stolen. The stolen rope had served in the execution of notorious "baby farmer" Amelia Carlisle, believed to have killed countless children. Could the two cases be connected? Backstories of the protagonists add texture to Rowland's tale, from Hugh's estrangement from his family because of his homosexuality to Sarah's fractious relationship with her criminal father to Mick's desperate crush on beautiful actress Catherine Price.Rowland's engaging team of sleuths and a colorful rogues' gallery of suspects make her third Victorian mystery a genuine page-turner. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.