When Maidens Mourn

January 23, 2012
Set in August 1812, Harris’s intriguing seventh Regency whodunit featuring aristocratic sleuth Sebastian St. Cyr (after 2011’s Where Shadows Dance) marks a return to form. St. Cyr has just married Hero Jarvis, the fiercely capable daughter of his bitterest enemy, Charles, Lord Jarvis, a cousin of the Prince Regent and the power behind the throne. The stabbing murder of Hero’s antiquarian friend, Gabrielle Tennyson, who was studying excavations at Camlet Moat in Trent, disrupts the newlyweds’ honeymoon plans. That Camlet Moat and the legendary Camelot may be one and the same is a more-than-academic point at a time when radicals are “calling for King Arthur to return... and save Britain from the benighted rule of the House of Hanover.” The couple pursue their investigations separately, at the risk of their fragile new relationship. Established fans will best appreciate the personal convolutions, but newcomers will have no trouble keeping up. Agent: Helen Breitwieser, Cornerstone Literary.

April 1, 2012
The search for Camelot disrupts a honeymoon in 1812. Four days into the pregnancy-driven marriage of Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, and Hero Jarvis, daughter of his sworn enemy, Miss Gabrielle Tennyson, an antiquarian who insisted that Camelot was located on the tiny bit of land known as Camlet Moat, is found floating in the moat, stabbed to death. When Bow Street calls upon Sebastian to deal with the death, Hero, a friend of Gabrielle, decides to nose around too. The first order of business: find out what has become of the vanished cousins who were with Gabrielle, young masters George, 9, and Alfred, 3. While their father is organizing a search for the boys, Sebastian focuses on possible motives for Gabrielle's slaying. She had had a tiff with another antiquarian about King Arthur and the authenticity of a supposed relic, the Glastonbury cross. But Hero's father, Lord Jarvis, also arouses suspicion through his parliamentary ties and his plotting against Napoleonic spies trying to destabilize the monarchy, including one whose heart may have belonged to Gabrielle. Then an estate manager is shot dead in the moat and the lovelorn French lieutenant dies. Although Sebastian sorts through the various motives and culprits, he still can't find the two boys. Their fate can be determined only by a detailed inspection of the Tennyson lineage that finally leaves time for Sebastian and Hero to resume the more passionate aspects of their honeymoon. History buffs will have a heyday hobnobbing with the Tennysons, "discovering" Arthur's burial site, dabbling in Druid enlightenment and siding with the Brits over Napoleon. Romantics will pine once more over Sebastian (When Shadows Dance, 2011, etc.).

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March 1, 2012

Regency England comes alive in Harris's seventh Sebastian St. Cyr novel (Where Shadows Dance). Sebastian's honeymoon with Hero Jarvis is disrupted by ancient legends and a fresh corpse.

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 1, 2012
Just days after Hero Jarvis and Sebastian St. Cyr are married in 1812 in London, Hero's close friend Gabrielle Tennyson is found murdered, and the two young cousins staying with her are missing. An antiquarian who stirred controversy over identifying the location of Camelot, Gabrielle was, like Hero, an independent and unconventional woman who eschewed the traditional female role. So while Sebastian is asked by local authorities to help investigate, Hero takes her own path in pursuit of the killer, sometimes at cross-purposes with her husband, on a course that adds to the distrust between the pair despite their mutual passion. In an atmosphere charged with deceit and danger, plus the burgeoning popular belief in the possible return of King Arthur, the pair uncovers Gabrielle's hidden life and the family secrets that led to her death. Impeccable historical research underlies this seventh in the St. Cyr series (after Where Shadows Dance, 2011), an absorbing mystery that leaves intriguing questionsabout the marriage and Hero's unborn child, as well as Sebastian's true parentageto be answered in future entries.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)