The Diabolical Bones

September 28, 2020
At the start of Ellis’s atmospheric sequel to 2019’s The Vanished Bride, likewise set in 1845 Yorkshire, Clifton Bradshaw and his grown son, Liston, discover a child’s skeleton in an abandoned chimney of their house on the moors. News of the find reaches Emily, Anne, and Charlotte Brontë, who learn that a medallion with 1832 on it was around the skeleton’s neck—and that 1832 was the year Clifton sealed the room with the chimney. Liston wonders whether his father intended to conceal the bones, and the sisters resolve to try to identify the remains after concluding that they belong to a murder victim. They get help from a friend with medical knowledge, who opines that the child, whose gender or cause of death she can’t ascertain, was malnourished and suffered serious illness. Meanwhile, the Brontës’ housekeeper declares that Clifton was in league with the devil and that the skeleton was evidence of a human sacrifice. As the creepy plot builds toward a satisfying solution, Ellis succeeds in making the sisters plausible investigators. Brontë fans will have a ball. Agent: Hellie Ogden, Janklow & Nesbit Assoc.