A Curious Beginning
A Veronica Speedwell Mystery
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4.3 • 317 Ratings
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- $2.99
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- $2.99
Publisher Description
The New York Times bestselling author of the Lady Julia Grey mysteries returns once more to Victorian England and introduces intrepid adventuress Veronica Speedwell....
London, 1887. After burying her spinster aunt, orphaned Veronica Speedwell is free to resume her world travels in pursuit of scientific inquiry—and the occasional romantic dalliance. As familiar with hunting butterflies as with fending off admirers, Veronica intends to embark upon the journey of a lifetime.
But fate has other plans when Veronica thwarts her own attempted abduction with the help of an enigmatic German baron, who offers her sanctuary in the care of his friend Stoker, a reclusive and bad-tempered natural historian. But before the baron can reveal what he knows of the plot against her, he is found murdered—leaving Veronica and Stoker on the run from an elusive assailant as wary partners in search of the villainous truth.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Set in 1887, this sparkling first in a new Victorian series from bestseller Raybourn (The Dark Inquiry and four other Lady Julia Grey mysteries) introduces 25-year-old Veronica Speedwell, who as an illegitimate child lived an itinerant existence with two female guardians. After returning home from the funeral of the last of her guardians, Veronica foils an abduction attempt with the assistance of an elderly stranger, Baron Maximilian von Stauffenbach, who remembers the mother Veronica knows nothing about. At the urging of the baron, who warns her that she's in mortal danger for reasons he can't yet reveal, she hides at the London home of reclusive natural historian Revelstoke "Stoker" Templeton-Vane. When the baron is murdered, Veronica and Stoker embark on a journey marked by present perils and past secrets. The intrepid Veronica's witty narration ("I abhorred weakness of any kind but most particularly in my tea") and the sexual tension she shares with the equally eccentric and articulate Stoker deliver a fun read with promises of more to come.
Customer Reviews
Memorial!
One of those books you remember for years and wait patiently for the next book to be written.
A curious beginning…
Great fun: wonderful repartee, period detail, inquisitive asides and joie de vivre. On to Book Two!
Not what I normally read
Needed to lighten up after For Whom the Bell Tolls and this caught my eye. An improbable feminist detective in Victorian England takes on the blue bloods and wins, all the while scaring her companion with her libertine views and always-right-ness. An entertaining read if you are not too sensitive to errors in time and place, such as photos in newspapers of the day and did I mention feminism? Oh, yeah.