Murder at the Breakers
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4.4 • 13 Ratings
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
For fans of HBO’s The Gilded Age, explore the dark side of the alluring world of America’s 19th century elite in this gripping series of riveting mysteries…
As the nineteenth century comes to a close, the illustrious Vanderbilt family dominates Newport, Rhode Island, high society. But when murder darkens a glittering affair at their summer home, reporter Emma Cross learns that sometimes the cream of the crop can curdle one’s blood . . .
Newport, Rhode Island, August 1895: She may be a less well-heeled relation, but as second cousin to millionaire patriarch Cornelius Vanderbilt, twenty-one-year-old Emma Cross is on the guest list for a grand ball at the Breakers, the Vanderbilts’ summer home. She also has a job to do—report on the event for the society page of the Newport Observer.
But Emma observes much more than glitz and gaiety when she witnesses a murder. The victim is Cornelius Vanderbilt’s financial secretary, who plunges off a balcony faster than falling stock prices. Emma’s black sheep brother Brady is found in Cornelius’s bedroom passed out next to a bottle of bourbon and stolen plans for a new railroad line. Brady has barely come to before the police have arrested him for the murder. But Emma is sure someone is trying to railroad her brother and resolves to find the real killer at any cost . . .
“Sorry to see the conclusion of Downton Abbey? Well, here is a morsel to get you through a long afternoon. Brew some Earl Grey and settle down with a scone with this one.”
—Washington Independent Review of Books
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Set in Newport, R.I., in 1895, Maxwell's pleasant series debut introduces 21-year-old Emmaline Cross, a poor member of the wealthy Vanderbilt clan. She earns her own living, drives her own carriage, and helps rescue her half-brother, "Brady" Gale, from many minor brushes with the law. At the housewarming of Cornelius Vanderbilt's newly completed home, the Breakers, Vanderbilt's financial secretary, Alvin Goddard, is viciously murdered. The police arrest Brady, who's found dead drunk at the scene with railroad plans he has stolen from Vanderbilt in his hands. Coming to his defense once again, Emma discovers that an old friend's troubled marriage, the secret assignations of Vanderbilt's son, and a charismatic stranger who is not what he seems may all be linked to the crime. Maxwell's language and situations can be anachronistic, but Emma's ebullience and the glittering details of Newport's gilded age past give the novel a brisk energy.
