The Countess of Prague

July 3, 2017
Beatrice “Trixie” von Falklenburg, the high-born narrator of Weeks’s captivating series launch set in pre-WWI Prague, has a reputation for solving little mysteries—which explains why her beloved Uncle Berty, a retired general, asks for her help in solving what could be a murder case. The body of an elderly man, his face battered beyond recognition, has been hauled out of the Vltava River. A laundry number stitched on the man’s underwear indicates that he is Alois Tager, who served years before as Uncle Berty’s batman in the army. Alois, however, turns out to be alive and well at the Invalides Hospital, where he resides as a pensioner. How did the dead man come to be wearing Alois’s underwear? With the aid of a few trusted servants and a cadre of street urchins, Trixie gets on a trail that leads to some startling revelations about her fellow blue bloods. Weeks (The Nerve Doctor) provides a refreshing glimpse into a time gone by in this well-wrought mix of historical fact and fiction.

August 1, 2017

Beatrice "Trixie" von Falklenburg is bored. After her father-in-law lost the family estates, she and husband Karel, the Count, can only afford to rent a palace. Karel is always off hunting with friends, so when a soldier's body is recovered from the Vltava River, and Trixie's great uncle, a general, asks for help, she jumps at the chance to play detective. Her investigation into an old man's past exposes her to a world of street urchins, deception, and dangerous train trips across Europe unaccompanied by a lady's maid. Eventually, the fate of Europe could rest in Trixie's attempt to discover why someone wants to interfere in the secret 1904 meeting between Edward VII of England and his nephew Kaiser Wilhelm. Weeks, a Prague-based author (The Nerve Doctor) and filmmaker, introduces a fascinating amateur sleuth in a planned series of ten novels to cover the years 1904-14. Trixie's keen observations reveal class differences and the social and cultural expectations of the time. VERDICT Dry wit, sexual innuendo, and extensive historical references in this atmospheric mystery may appeal to fans of Deanna Raybourn.--LH

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from August 1, 2017
Weeks' dramatic talent as writer and filmmaker comes alive in this ferociously readable first of 10 adventures featuring Beatrice von Falklenburg, the Countess of Prague, who thinks of her risk-taking self as Trixie. Not a moment passes without action or wonderfully descriptive passages that serve as backdrops to the evocative settings: 1904 Prague and London. As the tale unfolds, Trixie's new, liberated personality emerges through her quick-thinking, bold tenacity as she impetuously reinvents herself as a detective, tracking a killer across Europe. One can almost see her open-mouthed, estranged husband rethinking their marriage as he doles out cash and watches Trixie fly off to London dressed in drab (later she poses as a street boy), without a word of explanation. The central mystery is mired in household upheaval and eye-opening historical detail involving world leaders, a well-endowed tontine, some shifty shenanigans on the part of kleptomaniac Uncle Berty, and even Trixie's own butler. Highly entertaining, with a compelling mystery and a whirling dervish of a heroine who combines all the best traits of Elizabeth Peters' Amelia Peabody and Kerry Greenwood's Phryne Fisher, this wily, witty countess-sleuth's escapades will have readers clamoring for more.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)