Death in St. Petersburg

August 28, 2017
In bestseller Alexander’s well-crafted 12th Lady Emily novel (after 2016’s A Terrible Beauty), the redoubtable Englishwoman joins her husband, intelligence agent Colin Hargreaves, on a trip to St. Petersburg in January 1900. The couple attend a performance of Swan Lake at the Mariinksky Theatre, where ballet sensation Irina Nemetseva dances the lead, though they’re puzzled when another ballerina dances the final act. Later, they discover that Irina lies stabbed to death outside the stage door, still wearing her swan costume. After Prince Vasilii Guryanov, the dancer’s secret lover, asks Emily to help find her killer, Emily probes Irina’s circle, including her oldest friend and rival: fellow ballerina Ekaterina “Katenka” Sokolova. Katenka is the sister of Irina’s former love, a young man whose idealism is dangerous in repressive Russia. Do their tangled relationships give a motive to murder the star? In addition to a satisfying puzzle and the always appealing protagonist, Alexander delivers a memorable portrait of a fairy-tale city dancing on the brink of revolution. Agent: Anne Hawkins, John Hawkins & Associates.

August 1, 2017
The breathtaking beauty of St. Petersburg before the Russian Revolution provides a dazzling backdrop for murder.Colin Hargreaves, a covert agent for Great Britain, has recently been spending a great deal of time in Russia. Delighted to be able to join her husband and see St. Petersburg, Lady Emily Hargreaves gladly accepts an offer from her friend Cecile du Lac to accompany her there for the season. The elegant balls and cultural events are a joy to experience; the ladies' visit to the ballet follows a different script when the prima ballerina is found slashed to death in the snow. The next day Prince Vasilii Ruslanovich Guryanov begs Lady Emily to investigate the murder of Irina Semenova Nemetseva, more familiarly known to him as Irusya. With Colin preoccupied by his own problems, Emily agrees to see what she can discover. Irusya's best friend, Katenka, danced Irusya's part in Swan Lake the night she was killed, making a sensational debut bound to advance her career and provide a plausible motive for murder. As Emily continues her investigation, Alexander provides the back stories of the two friends and their romances. Irusya, who came from a wealthy family, was in love with Lev, Katenka's brother but, unwilling to give up her dancing and lifestyle, carried on several affairs with wealthy aristocrats. Lev has fallen on hard times and become involved with a group calling for peaceful reforms that stop short of revolution. Although Emily is presented with many motives for murder, none ring quite true to her. The purest mystery among Alexander's adventures (A Terrible Beauty, 2016, etc.) presents a challenging puzzle, a historically interesting period, and detailed descriptions of one of the world's most beautiful cities.

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September 15, 2017
This twelfth in the Lady Emily Ashton series features St. Petersburg's famed Marinsky Theatre ballet. One evening in 1900, during intermission, the prima ballerina, Nemetseva, disappears and is found lying dead outside the theater. Naturally, Lady Emily is drawn into the investigation. Understanding the psychological depth of the crime requires examining the years when the dancers were in training and when friendships and rivalries were formed. Unfortunately, some cumbersome timeline switches lead to erratic pacing, but the otherworldly atmosphere, driven by the appearance of a ghostly dancer and the chill of the crisply evoked St. Petersburg winter, help to compensate, as do the dancers' complex relationships, which provide a juicy wealth of suspects. Lady Emily has no compunction, of course, about asking awkward questions, and her social status allows her to interview prince and pauper alike. She is consistently witty, smart, and entertaining. Fans of intrepid female Victorian sleuths like Lady Emily should also try Deanna Raybourn's Lady Julia Grey series, as well as Kate Saunders' The Secrets of Wishtide (2016) and Stephen Weeks' The Countess of Prague (2017).(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)

May 15, 2017

In St. Petersburg with her husband, Lady Emily investigates the death of a ballerina found blood-spattered in the snow, even as a ghostly dancer in white slips through the city, trailing red scarves and confounding everyone. From the New York Times best-selling writer, following A Terrible Beauty.

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