Farriers' Lane /

Perry's Thomas and Charlotte Pitt mysteries, set in Victorian London, are a long-running success on the historical whodunit circuit. In the duo's thirteenth adventure, Thomas is investigating the murder of a prominent judge, a crime he feels is linked to the macabre Farrier's Lane murder. A young Jew, Aaron Godman, was hanged for the Farrier's Lane crime some years before, but the murdered judge, who heard Godman's final appeal, seemed to be considering reopening the case. The evidence in both murders is frustratingly difficult to uncover and the witnesses strangely reluctant to talk. The stymied Pitt is under pressure from his superiors to solve the judge's murder quickly and leave the earlier case buried. It's Charlotte to the rescue, proving that a wife's social contacts are as valuable as a copper's badge. Perry is wonder~fully adept at depicting the customs, manners, morality, fashions, and speech of Victorian London. Her characters are authentically and appealingly drawn, and her plot is sinister, gripping, and intense, with a surprising but satisfying ending. Like the earlier entries in the series, this is certain to be popular with fans of historical mysteries. ~--Emily Melton

In the riveting 13th adventure of Victorian police Inspector Thomas Pitt and his wife, Charlotte, Perry ( Belgrave Square ) reshuffles her deck of series characters while adeptly weaving in themes of anti-Semitism and abuse of the law. When appeals court judge Samuel Stafford dies at a London theater, the Pitts are in the audience as well. The inspector, who immediately suspects poisoning, is eventually assigned to the case and soon surmises a connection between the killing and the dead man's recent attempt to reopen the notorious Farrier's Lane case of five years earlier, in which a young Jewish man was hanged for killing a friend and crucifying him to a stable door with horseshoe nails. While Pitt determines that Mrs. Stafford and her lover may have played roles in the judge's murder, he also faces the possibility that in solving this case he might uncover a miscarriage of justice in the earlier one, which officials make clear should remain closed. But then the police sergeant who brought in the convicting evidence in that trial is found hanging from his bedroom ceiling, and Thomas, Charlotte, her mother and great-aunt, and even the Pitts' maid Gracie apply themselves to the solution. Even Oscar Wilde has a cameo appearance, supplying the vital clue in this convincing look at the seamy side of Victorian life. (Apr.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Perry's established audience will clamor for this newest Inspector Pitt offering. Pitt's investigation into the death of a judge leads him to a notorious, unsolved crucifixion murder. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 12/92. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

In this 13th outing for Victorian-era Police Inspector Thomas Pitt and his well-born wife Charlotte (Belgrave Square, etc.), it's Gracie, the Pitt maid of all work, who uncovers the most telling and dramatic clue. The story starts with the poisoning murder of Court of Appeals Judge Samuel Stafford, in his box at the theater. Pitt's job is to determine whether the motive is connected to the hanging execution, five years before, of Aaron Godman, convicted of a particularly gruesome killing that roused anti-Semitic hysteria at the time. On the day of his death, Stafford had visited several of the lawyers involved in the Godman trial and subsequent appeal. Had he found something that might clear Godman's name--the goal of a persistent campaign by Godman's actress sister Tamar? Could the discreet affair between Stafford's wife Juniper and lawyer Adolphus Pryce have a bearing on the crime? When Constable Paterson, a major witness in Godman's trial, is found hanged in his bachelor lodgings, the case assumes an urgency that pushes Gracie to the impulsive act that marks the beginning of the end. Perry's expert hand with the Victorian scene is verbosely overplayed here, as is the florid, not-always-convincing plot. The same mixture, then, but suffering an attack of bloat.