The Last Days of Newgate
A gripping historical detective story set in the heart of old London
-
- $0.99
-
- $0.99
Publisher Description
'A story of high intrigue and low politics, brutal murder and cunning conspiracies . . . tangy and rambunctious stuff!' Observer
'Gripping and atmospheric' Daily Express
'Enjoyably disturbing . . . likely to leave the reader clamouring for more' TLS
St Giles, London, 1829: three people have been brutally murdered and the city simmers with anger and political unrest. Pyke, sometime Bow Street Runner, sometime crook, finds himself accidentally embroiled in the murder investigation but quickly realises that he has stumbled into something more sinister and far-reaching.
In his pursuit of the murderer, Pyke ruffles the feathers of some powerful people and, falsely accused of murder himself, he soon faces a death sentence and the gallows. Imprisoned, and with only his uncle and the headstrong, aristocratic daughter of his greatest enemy to help, Pyke must engineer his escape, find the real killer and untangle the web of intrigue that has been spun around him.
A story of intrigue, conspiracy and murder set in 19th-century Britain for fans of Antonia Hodgson, Ripper Street and Patrick Easter.
'The novel drips with all the atmospheric details of a pre-Victorian murder mystery - "pea-soupers", dingy lanterns and laudanum' The Times
'Pyke ia an intriguingly unfathomable character' Financial Times
'Pyke is violent, vengeful and conflicted in the best tradition of detectives. His story takes in grisly murder and torture, and uses 1800s London in the same way that hard-boiled fiction uses Los Angeles as a mirror of a corrupt society' Time Out
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Set in 1829 London, Pepper's hard-hitting first Pyke mystery introduces the vicious and vengeful Pyke, a crooked Bow Street Runner. Reform-minded home secretary Robert Peel plans a new police force to replace the Bow Street Runners, whose cozy relationship with London's low-life and corrupt elite have benefited Pyke and company, heretofore the only law enforcers in town. The murders of a runaway Protestant/Catholic Irish couple and of Pyke's mistress inflame sectarian conflicts. Framed by his enemies, Pyke is sent to notorious Newgate prison, where he and an aristocratic female prison reformer begin a long and tortured relationship. In a gripping chase scene, Pyke manages to escape Newgate and find his way to Ulster in pursuit of a hate-ridden Irish constable. While readers will learn a lot about the turbulent period in British history that culminated in Catholic emancipation, the brutish Pyke and the book's graphic violence won't be to every taste.