Face Down Beneath the Eleanor Cross - Hardcover

Emerson, Kathy Lynn

3.85

235 ratings by Goodreads

9780312205447: Face Down Beneath the Eleanor Cross

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0312205449 ISBN 13: 9780312205447

Publisher: Minotaur Books, 2000

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Susanna, Lady Appleton, has been mourning the supposed death of her husband Robert. Yet a coded message instructs Susanna to meet him in a London alehouse. When he does not appear, and a disguised Robert turns up dead beneath the Eleanor Cross, Lady Appleton is accused of the crime--and will hang unless she finds the true killer.

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From the Publisher:

"The story is wonderfully enhanced by herbal lore (decoctions, potions an balms) and a heated forbidden romance . . . There is always someone lurking behind an arras or scuttling along a secret passage." Publishers Weekly

From Kirkus Reviews:

Although her era's ominous intrigues are everywhere evident, Elizabeth I appears only offstage in Lady Susanna Appleton's fourth adventure (Face Down Among the Winchester Geese, 1999, etc.), which begins in 1565 as Elizabeth's favorite, Robin Dudley, fingers herbalist Susanna as the culprit who poisoned her late husband. The unlamented Robert Appleton turns out to be more mischievous than any self-respecting corpse, posthumously summoning Susanna to meet him in Winchester via coded messageits code based, in Emersons sly joke, on John Knox's misogynist Monstrous Regiment of Women. Indeed, as copies of the book keep popping up, more women, mostly Robert's former mistresses, become likely suspects in his murder. Could one of them have turned deadly, or are Robert's political connections more likely? Vulnerable as Elizabeth's heir, Lady Mary Grey has cause to hate him. Annabel MacReynolds, a spy for French regent Catherine de Medici, has tricked Robert with her body and knows the Knox code. Then Susanna's ally Sir Walter Pendennis, his loyalty already compromised by his new inamorata Eleanor Lowell, is distracted by his rivalry with lawyer Matthew Grimshaw for Susannas friendship. Usually confident and competent, Susanna is a less dynamic figure under threat of trial and murder herself; but she has mentored both her superstitious housekeeper, Jennet, and Robert's surprising sister, Catherine, well in previous adventures. Faithful friends track the past until Susanna, in a final cozy gathering, unmasks the obvious villain. Despite a mystery that eventually turns messy and some cumbersome period detail, Emerson gets a star for high drama and the graceful planting of background information. -- Copyright �2000, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

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