A Beautiful Blue Death, By Charles Finch

Charles Lenox, Victorian gentleman and armchair explorer, likes nothing more than to relax in his private study with a cup of tea, a roaring fire and a good book. But when his lifelong friend Lady Jane asks for his help, Lenox cannot resist the chance to unravel a mystery.
Prudence Smith, one of Jane’s former servants, is dead of an apparent suicide. But Lenox suspects something far more sinister: murder, by a rare and deadly poison. The grand house where the girl worked is full of suspects, and though Prue had dabbled with the hearts of more than a few men, Lenox is baffled by the motive for the girl’s death.
When another body turns up during the London season’s most fashionable ball, Lenox must untangle a web of loyalties and animosities. Was it jealousy that killed Prudence Smith? Or was it something else entirely? And can Lenox find the answer before the killer strikes again—this time, disturbingly close to home?
Finch is a new author to me, I decided to start this series at the beginning. So far there are three Lenox mysteries. I read somewhere how they were comparing the main character Lenox to Sherlock Holmes. I didn't see any resemblance between the two other than they are both white males that like to solve crimes. While I did like parts of the story and plan to read book two. I had a difficult time finishing the book. Found it slow and some of the dialogue boring some words like "Sir" used far to much in conversations. 2.5 out of 5

Drood, By Dan Simmons

Blurb: On June 9, 1865, while traveling by train to London with his secret mistress, 53-year-old Charles Dickens--at the height of his powers and popularity, the most famous and successful novelist in the world and perhaps in the history of the world--hurtled into a disaster that changed his life forever.
Did Dickens begin living a dark double life after the accident? Were his nightly forays into the worst slums of London and his deepening obsession with corpses, crypts, murder, opium dens, the use of lime pits to dissolve bodies, and a hidden subterranean London mere research . . . or something more terrifying?
Just as he did in The Terror, Dan Simmons draws impeccably from history to create a gloriously engaging and terrifying narrative. Based on the historical details of Charles Dickens's life and narrated by Wilkie Collins (Dickens's friend, frequent collaborator, and Salieri-style secret rival), DROOD explores the still-unsolved mysteries of the famous author's last years and may provide the key to Dickens's final, unfinished work: The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Chilling, haunting, and utterly original, DROOD is Dan Simmons at his powerful best.
This is the first Simmons book I have read, I was intrigued with the books premise, I felt the book was way too long almost 800 pages. Found the skipping from the past to future, and present all a bit too much. But there were some excellent parts. Simmons draws the seedy part of London well that along with the Dickens/Wilkie interaction are the best parts. But I didn't feel he really ever captured the spirit of Drood. 3 out of 5

Deanna Raybourn, The Dead Travel Fast

A husband, a family, a comfortable life: Theodora Lestrange lives in terror of it all.
With a modest inheritance and the three gowns that comprise her entire wardrobe, Theodora leaves Edinburgh—and a disappointed suitor—far behind. She is bound for Rumania, where tales of vampires are still whispered, to visit an old friend and write the book that will bring her true independence.
She arrives at a magnificent, decaying castle in the Carpathians, replete with eccentric inhabitants: the ailing dowager; the troubled steward; her own fearful friend, Cosmina. But all are outstripped in dark glamour by the castle's master, Count Andrei Dragulescu.

Bewildering and bewitching in equal measure, the brooding nobleman ignites Theodora's imagination and awakens passions in her that she can neither deny nor conceal. His allure is superlative, his dominion over the superstitious town, absolute—Theodora may simply be one more person under his sway.
Before her sojourn is ended—or her novel completed—Theodora will have encountered things as strange and terrible as they are seductive. For obsession can prove fatal…and she is in danger of falling prey to more than desire.

I didn't like this book as much as I wanted to. The setting was dark along with the characters. 3 out of 5

Dorothy & Thomas Hoobler, The Monsters Mary Shelley & The Curse Of Frankenstein

Blurb:The remarkable true story of Frankenstein's origins and the curse on its creators.
On a dark and stormy night in 1816, on the shore of Lake Geneva in Switzerland, Lord Byron, famed English poet, challenged his friends to a contest--to write a ghost story. The assembled group included the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley; his lover (and future wife) Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin; Mary's stepsister Claire Claremont; and Byron's physician, John William Polidori. The famous result of that night was Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, a work that appeared in print two years later and has retained its hold on the popular imagination for almost two centuries. Less well-known was Polidori's work, the first vampire novel. It too would inspire a legend (and most directly Bram Stoker's Dracula), as well as many nightmares. And the evening begat a curse, too: Within a few years of Frankenstein's publication, nearly all of those involved met untimely deaths.

THE MONSTERS tells the riveting story of the real-life characters surrounding the creation of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. It reveals not just the origins of two of the most famous monsters in popular culture, but the monstrous nature of the young people who gathered on the shore of Lake Geneva. Gripping and spooky, THE MONSTERS is unforgettable.

One of the most well written and engaging biographies I have read. I new very little about these 5 people before, now I have better understanding of who they were and just how great. To me Byron benefited most from the Shelley's while Percy gained more from friendship with Byron. Mary Shelley may have never written Frankenstein if not for Byron that summer. 5 out of 5

Katherine McMahon, The Alchemist's Daughter

Blurb:Dark secrets haunt the manor house at Selden in Buckinghamshire, where Emilie Selden, motherless, fiercely intelligent and more beautiful than she realises, has been raised in near isolation by her father.

John Selden, student of Isaac Newton, is conducting a bold and secret experiment. He aims to turn Emilie into a brilliant natural philosopher and alchemist. Secluded in his ancient manor house, with only their two servants for company, he fills her with knowledge and records every step she takes.

In the spring of 1725, when Emilie is eighteen, father and daughter begin their most daring alchemical adventure of all - an attempt to breathe life into dead matter. But their work is interrupted by the arrival of two strangers, one a researcher into the life of plants, the other a dazzling young merchant. During the course of a sultry August, whilst her father is away, Emilie is caught up in the passion of first love and, listening for the first time to her heart rather than her head, she makes her choice…with consequences that are far-reaching and tumultuous.
While the story really isn't anything new. A story of a women who makes a choice to love over her fathers wishes. And comes to realize just how much her father meant to her. Overall I liked the premise and kept wondering how it would all end if her husband would turn out to be a user, if she would find peace with her choices. 4 out of 5

Alice Munro, Too Much Happiness

10 Short Stories that left me wondering.... I found all the stories to be about sad parts of life. Of course life isn't just wine and roses but I generally like my books to be balanced, some happiness, some trials and tribulations. Munro does a wonderful job of making her case that events in our early years shape our lives. We all change and must except people for who they are at the time. 3 out of 5 stars.

Where Serpents Sleep, By C.S. Harris

Blurb: London, 1812. The brutal slaughter of eight young prostitutes in a house of refuge near Convent Garden leaves only one survivor—and one witness: Hero Jarvis, reform-minded daughter of the Prince Regent's cousin, Lord Jarvis. When the Machiavellian power broker squashes any official inquiry that might reveal his daughter's unorthodox presence, Hero launches an investigation of her own and turns to Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, for help. Still struggling to come to terms with the loss of his lover, Kat Boleyn, and the resultant estrangement from his father, Sebastian is at first reluctant to agree. But the callous violence of the murders—combined with the opportunity to provoke his archenemy, Jarvis—prompts him to act.
This is my favorite book and cover of the series. The book moves smoothly with characters true to their time period. Hero is a strong independent young women who is enjoyable to read about. I hope there will be more of these to read. 4.5 out of 5