Description
London 1887: a year of Continental anarchist- and American-financed Fenian violence.
The suspicious death of Patrick O’Rorke’s boyhood friend Tom O’Brien – the internationally famous tenor known as Tomaso Briani – propels the former colonial detective into dangerous places when he is called on to investigate by both Briani’s mysterious widow, the Contessa di Stephani, and ambitious but devious Detective Chief Inspector Wilson of Scotland Yard’s Special Branch, himself embroiled in the Yard’s own labyrinthine power struggles.
As other old friends, enemies and ghosts from O’Rorke’s past in New Zealand, Ireland and America rise up again to haunt him, the alliance of a Fenian cell – led by his former professional rival Declan Burke and his mortal enemy Bogdan Lynskey – threatens his life and the lives of everyone close to him.
The fast-moving action takes us from London’s fashionable Belgravia and Kensington to Ireland’s Limerick Town and O’Rorke’s birthplace, before reaching its midnight climax at the highwayman Tibbet’s Corner on Wimbledon Common, where a truth is finally revealed and a mortal shot is fired.
About the Author
An accomplished biographer and novelist, Edmund Bohan was a finalist in the Montana New Zealand Book Awards in 1995 and again in 1999. His O’Rorke series of historical novels includes The Opawa Affair, The Dancing Man, The Matter of Parihaka (recently re-published), The Irish Yankee, A Present for the Czar and The Lost Taonga. The eighth in the series, Turn On, Old Time, is available now on this website.
An honours graduate from the University of Canterbury, Bohan has 19 published titles and has also written and published historical non-fiction, given radio talks, written short stories and numerous articles. For 25 years he was one of New Zealand’s most successful singers in Britain.
Edmund Bohan lives in Christchurch.
Reviews
“Bohan is known in his native land as an accomplished biographer and novelist …having published a range of historical non-fiction as well. Needless to say in both these novels, the historical aspects are delivered in a comprehensive manner, delivering something that feels very real, and accurate without being too bogged down. … The plots are great. … Definitely a series for fans of historical mysteries, these are well written, well-researched and very well balanced between the detail and pace.”
Karen Chisholm, AustCrimefiction
