The Poison Bed
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3.4 • 5 Ratings
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
A spellbinding thriller set in the Jacobean Court of 1615 surrounding a famed couple imprisoned on suspicion of murder—but was it Lord Robert or Lady Frances who committed the crime?
A marriage. A murder. One of them did it. Which of them will die for it?
In the autumn of 1615, scandal rocks the Jacobean court, when a celebrated couple, Robert and Frances Carr, are imprisoned on suspicion of murder. Frances is young, captivating, and from a notorious family. She has been rescued from an abusive marriage by Robert, and is determined to make a new life for herself. Whatever the price.
Robert is one of the richest and most famous men in the kingdom. He has risen from nothing to become one of the country’s most powerful men. But to get to the top, you cannot help making enemies.
Some believe she is innocent; others think her wicked or insane. He claims no knowledge of the murder. The king suspects them both, though it is his secret at stake. Now a man is dead. And someone must pay with their life.
Who is telling the truth? Who has the most to lose? And who is willing to commit murder?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Set in England during the reign of James I, this craftily constructed historical from Fremantle (Queen's Gambit) makes deft use of a real-life crime that provoked "a scandal that rocked the Jacobean court and was one of the initial cracks that would eventually lead to the devastation of the Stuart monarchy," according to an author's note. Fremantle creates suspense by delaying the revelation of the poisoning victim's identity, unfolding the story through alternating sections told from the differing perspectives of the two main suspects: Robert Carr, who may have been James I's secret lover, and Carr's wife, Frances Howard. The origins of their relationship and the resulting intrigue that led to the fatal poisoning is recounted in flashbacks, as Carr and Howard are introduced while prisoners in the Tower of London, interrogated separately in the hopes of eliciting a confession that will implicate both of them. Fremantle does a masterly job of recreating the feel of the period, along with making the atmosphere of suspicion and plotting palpable. Readers will eagerly await her next historical.
