Lady Darby returns to London with her new husband, Sebastian Gage, but newlywed bliss won't last for long when her past comes back to haunt her in the latest exciting installment in this national bestselling series.
November 1831. After fleeing London in infamy more than two years prior, Lady Kiera Darby's return to the city is anything but mundane, though not for the reasons she expected. A gang of body snatchers is arrested on suspicion of imitating the notorious misdeeds of Edinburgh criminals, Burke and Hare--killing people from the streets and selling their bodies to medical schools. Then Kiera's past--a past she thought she'd finally made peace with--rises up to haunt her.
All of London is horrified by the evidence that "burkers" are, indeed, at work in their city. The terrified populace hovers on a knife's edge, ready to take their enmity out on any likely suspect. And when Kiera receives a letter of blackmail, threatening to divulge details about her late anatomist husband's involvement with the body snatchers and wrongfully implicate her, she begins to apprehend just how precarious her situation is. Not only for herself, but also her new husband and investigative partner, Sebastian Gage, and their unborn child.
Meanwhile, the young scion of a noble family has been found murdered a block from his home, and the man's family wants Kiera and Gage to investigate. Is it a failed attempt by the London burkers, having left the body behind, or the crime of someone much closer to home? Someone who stalks the privileged, using the uproar over the burkers to cover his own dark deeds?
Anna Lee Huber is the Daphne Award-winning author of the national bestselling Lady Darby Mysteries and the Verity Kent Mysteries. She is a summa cum laude graduate of Lipscomb University in Nashville, Tennessee, where she majored in music and minored in psychology. She currently resides with her family and is hard at work on her next novel.
Praise for An Artless Demise:
"Anna Lee Huber has done it again! An Artless Demise is an unputdownable story, with an indomitable heroine, a great supporting cast, and a gripping, propulsive narrative with real history at its core."—USA Today bestselling author Sherry Thomas
"Anna Lee Huber keeps upping her game--An Artless Demise is the perfect blend of history, mystery, and one of my favorite sleuthing couples!"—Susanna Kearsley, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author
"Intriguing, captivating and well-crafted...An Artless Demise immediately captures the imagination."—Susann Calkins, award-winning author of the Lucy Campion Mysteries and the Speakeasy Murders
Praise for the Lady Darby Mysteries:
"A missing heir, an estranged family, and a possible poisoner add up to a pretty puzzle for two far-from-disinterested sleuths....Huber draws on the beauties and dangers of the mysterious moorlands to provide a fitting setting for a knotty mystery filled with envy, greed, and thwarted love."--Kirkus Reviews
"Riveting...An original premise, an enigmatic heroine, and a compelling Highland setting."--Deanna Raybourn, New York Times bestselling author
"[A] history mystery in fine Victorian style!"--Julia Spencer-Fleming, New York Times bestselling author
"[A] fascinating heroine...A thoroughly enjoyable read!"--Victoria Thompson, national bestselling author
"Huber's debut...reads like a cross between a gothic novel and a mystery with a decidedly unusual heroine."--Kirkus Reviews
"Set largely in Scotland in 1830, Huber's well-done sequel to 2012's The Anatomist's Wife includes all the ingredients of a romantic suspense novel, starting with a proud and independent heroine...Strong and lively characters as well as believable family dynamics, however, elevate this above stock genre fare."--Publishers Weekly
