Now and Then Stab
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4.4 • 12 Ratings
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- $4.99
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- $4.99
Publisher Description
Spring, 1593. A ballad is posted in the heart of London inciting violence. The Lord Mayor offers one hundred crowns for the name of the author. Thomas Clarady wants that money and drags Francis Bacon into the game. At first it's just a riddle to be solved. Tom talks to poets, while Francis analyzes the verse.
Things take a dangerous turn when the authorities focus on two popular playmakers. One is cruelly tortured. Another is killed in dubious circumstances. Did he start a brawl that ended in tragedy? Or was he murdered by his dinner companions? The official story seems plausible, at first. But Tom doesn't buy it. Distraught at the death of his friend, he refuses stop digging, uncovering a plot he should have left buried.
Francis Bacon and his team hazard their lives and reputations to determine the truth. Whether justice can ever be obtained is another matter.
Customer Reviews
Truth, Law, and Libels
Anna Castle’s mysteries often focus on questions of conspiracy and secrecy in different historical moments—Victorian financial crime in the Prof. and Mrs. Moriarty series and religious and political intrigues in the Bacon novels. Now and Then Stab takes up the mysterious death of Christopher Marlowe, but this is only one of the numerous conspiracies and rumors of conspiracy swirling around the Bacons, Tom, and Trumpet. (In fact, Marlowe’s death only takes place midway through the plot, which in my mind successfully provides the needed context and avoids the frequent temptation of historical fiction authors of treating famous unsolved deaths as somehow separate from their era.)
Nearly all of the subplots concern the differences between appearance and reality, as well as the tricky matter of disentangling what one really believes from what one should or must say in public: the matter of the libel that sets off the initial mystery, Francis’s political career, Tom’s and Trumpet’s relationship and differing feelings about marriage, and the recurring question of Marlowe’s atheism. There are also some fascinating (if troubling) resonances with current debates about the power of truth and lies and control over public opinion. Overall, I enjoyed this blend of politics and poetry, and look forward to more!