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Laddar... The Butcher of Smithfield (2008)av Susanna Gregory
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Gå med i LibraryThing för att få reda på om du skulle tycka om den här boken. Det finns inga diskussioner på LibraryThing om den här boken. This is the third book in the Thomas Chaloner series. In this book, Thomas has recently returned London after a dangerous four month mission in Spain and Portugal. His patron has asked him to prove that a rather unsavoury lawyer was murdered. The cause of death was ruled as "death by cucumbers". Thomas finds himself in the middle of a number of these kinds of death, and he has to try to unravel what is going on. Problems abound, confusion is the rule of the day, and London is nearly drowning in a flood caused by massive rains and a high tide that overlap. Thomas does his damn best to keep his head when everyone else is losing theirs - sometimes literally. Picturesque and descriptive, you can literally smell the scents of Old London through the pages. inga recensioner | lägg till en recension
Ingår i serienThomas Chaloner (3)
Susanna Gregory, author of the Matthew Bartholomew series of medieval mysteries, has created another compelling fictional detective set in Restoration London. -------------------------------------------- The third adventure in the Thomas Chaloner series. Having just returned from a clandestine excursion to Spain and Portugal on behalf of the Queen, Thomas Chaloner finds London dank and grey under leaden skies. He finds many things changed, including the Government slapping a tax on printed newspapers. Handwritten news reports escape the duty, and the rivalry between the producers of the two conduits of news is the talk of the coffee houses with the battle to be first with any sort of intelligence escalating into violent rivalry. And it seems that a number of citizens who have eaten cucumbers have come to untimely deaths. It is such a death which Chaloner is despatched to investigate; that of a lawyer with links to 'the Butcher of Smithfield', a shady trader surrounded by a fearsome gang of thugs who terrorise the streets well beyond the confines of Smithfield market. Chaloner doesn't believe that either this death or the others are caused by a simple vegetable, but to prove his theory he has to untangle the devious means of how news is gathered and he has to put his personal safety aside as he tries to penetrate the rumour mill surrounding the Butcher of Smithfield and discover his real identity. 'Pungent with historical detail' (Irish Times) 'A richly imagined world of colourful medieval society and irresistible monkish sleuthing' (Good Book Guide) 'Corpses a-plenty, exciting action sequences and a satisfying ending' (Mystery People) Inga biblioteksbeskrivningar kunde hittas. |
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Google Books — Laddar... GenrerMelvil Decimal System (DDC)823.914Literature English & Old English literatures English fiction Modern Period 1901-1999 1945-1999Klassifikation enligt LCBetygMedelbetyg:
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Thomas Chaloner, recently returned from a trip to Portugal and Spain for the Queen, is ordered by his employer, the Lord Chancellor, to investigate the death of a crooked solicitor, Tom Newburne, who died in the Smithfield market while chomping on a cucumber. Cucumbers were unpopular for eating even before this although ladies sometimes used them for their beauty regime and some people made a decoction of the seeds to cure wind. Newburne was about the fifth person known to have died of eating them and almost immediately another man, a musician named Maylord who was a friend of Chaloner's father and who had left an urgent message for Thomas, was found dead with a cucumber in his mouth. Chaloner soon discovered Maylord had been smothered and he suspected that the other deaths attributed to cucumbers were also murder. So he adds those investigations to his roster. He is also concerned that his friend, bookshop owner William Leybourn, has taken up with a woman who seems to have dubious acquaintances and who is probably only interested in Leybourn for his wealth. Some of the people he encounters in his investigations are involved with the newspaper business. There are newsbooks which are printed and government approved and there are newsletters which are hand written. There is a fierce rivalry between the two forms of news gathering with the government newsbooks being run by a rake called L'Estrange and the newsletters being published by the former newsbooks editor, Muddiman. L'Estrange believes that Muddiman is stealing the material from his newsbooks and publishing it before he can get his publications printed. And then added into the mix is the crime boss, the so-called Butcher of Smithfield, who has a gang of thugs at his disposal. He is rumoured to dispose of his enemies by putting their bodies into the pies he sells in his butcher shop. All this transpires as the worst year for rain and storms besets England causing widespread flooding and collapsing bridges. Chaloner tries to make sense of everything while having no money because his employer won't pay him until he solves Newburne's murder. At one point he is reduced to making a rat stew to eat!
I figured out several of the devices used to mystify matters long before they occurred to Chaloner. I don't think it is because I am particularly clever; I just think Gregory made it pretty obvious which is not my idea of a good mystery. For those who have caught up with all of C. J. Sansom's Shardlake books this might be another way to immerse yourself in English history but don't expect it to be of the same caliber as Sansom's books. ( )