Murder, Matrimony, and Other Tuesday Engagements

A Cozy Regency Mystery of Love and Murder

A fiancé, a corpse, and a house party that is not allowed to go home.

Clemency Harrow does not object to marriage in principle; she simply prefers not to be traded for canal shares and an allegedly reformed rake before breakfast. Packed off to Ashbourne Hall to meet her scandalous intended, she expects awkward teas, pious small talk, and a jury of relatives deciding whether she is worthy of a disreputable earl with an excellent jawline.

Instead, her most tedious cousin keels over in the pudding course. The wine becomes the most discussed guest at table, the blancmange looks guilty, and their unruffled host calmly announces that no one is leaving the house until the matter of the corpse is tidied away. Preferably without inviting Bow Street or public scandal.

On paper, anyone might have wanted Horace Pettigrew permanently silent: the widowed grand dame with a suspiciously glittering past; the colonel who has seen cleaner deaths; fragile Miss Temples; the nervous clergyman; the exacting cousin who keeps Ashbourne’s ledgers far too well; the servants who move like ghosts; and the inconvenient bride who insists on examining the body in the green parlour. Did someone poison a single glass or the whole decanter? What, precisely, had Horace been collecting about them all? And why is Clemency increasingly certain she can trust Lord Ashbourne with her investigation, if not yet her hand?

A darkly comic, cozy Regency mystery of murder, manners, and inconvenient attraction, perfect for readers who love witty historical whodunits, slow burn romance, closed circle country house mysteries, and closed door swoons. After all, murder, matrimony, and other Tuesday engagements go down far more smoothly with a clever heroine, an annoyingly compelling earl, and absolutely no second helpings of wine.

When Miss Clemency Harrow is calmly informed that she is engaged to a notorious earl in payment of her father’s debts, she expects awkward dinners, chilly portraits, and perhaps a sulky lake. She does not expect her tedious cousin to keel over at the pudding course and turn her future home into the site of a very impolite murder.

Trapped at Ashbourne Hall, with a dead guest in the green parlour and a host whose past is as disreputable as his shoulders are distracting, Clemency refuses to flutter or faint. While the vicar blames Providence and the ton whispers about scandal, she quietly begins to count motives and opportunities: the calculating cousin who manages Ashbourne’s books, the sharp tongued widow who knows everyone’s secrets, the colonel with a temper, the sisters who hear everything, and a household that has learned to keep its mouth shut. If she cannot untangle the truth, she risks her father’s ruin, her own unwanted reputation, and a marriage built on lies instead of inconvenient honesty.

A clue rich, fair play mystery with non gory deaths, a closed door slow burn romance, and a warm, hopeful ending. Perfect for readers who enjoy sharp tongued heroines, manor house house-parties gone wrong, poison in the wine rather than on the page, and slow, reluctant attraction between two people who would both prefer to be in charge.

Pack your best manners, sharpen your suspicions, and step into Ashbourne Hall tonight before the next course is served.