Not since the bloody deeds of Jack the Ripper have Londoners felt such terror as that aroused by the gruesome beheadings in Hyde Park. And if newly promoted Police Superintendent Thomas Pitt does not quickly apprehend the perpetrator, he is likely to lose his own head, professionally speaking. Yet even with the help of Charlotte Pitt’s subtle investigation, the sinister violence continues unchecked. And in a shocking turn of events that nearly convinces the pair of sleuths that they have met their match, the case proves to be Pitt’s toughest ever.

Not since the bloody deeds of Jack the Ripper have Londoners felt such terror as that aroused by the gruesome beheadings in Hyde Park. And if newly promoted Police Superintendent Thomas Pitt does not quickly apprehend the perpetrator, he is likely to lose his own head, professionally speaking. Yet even with the help of Charlotte Pitt's subtle investigation, the sinister violence continues unchecked. And in a shocking turn of events that nearly convinces the pair of sleuths that they have met their match, the case proves to be Pitt's toughest ever.

When the distinguished Mr. Justice Stafford dies of opium poisoning, his shocking demise resurrects one of the most sensational cases ever to inflame England: the murder five years before of Kingsley Blaine, whose body was found crucified in Farriers’ Lane. Amid the public hysteria for revenge, the police had arrested a Jewish actor who was soon condemned to hang. Police Inspector Thomas Pitt, investigating Stafford’s death, is drawn into the Farriers’ Lane murder as well, for it appears that Stafford may have been about to reopen the case. Pitt receives curiously little help from his colleagues on the force, but his wife, Charlotte, gleans from her social engagements startling insights into both cases. And slowly both Thomas and Charlotte begin to reach for the same sinister and deeply dangerous truth.

Clemency Shaw, the wife of a prominent doctor, has died in a tragic fire in the peaceful suburb of Highgate. But the blaze was set by an arsonist, and it is unclear whether she or Dr. Shaw was the intended victim—or did the doctor himself set the blaze in order to inherit his wife’s large fortune? Baffled by the scarcity of clues in this terrible crime, Inspector Thomas Pitt turns to the people who had been closest to the couple—Clemency’s stuffy but distinguished relatives. Meanwhile, Pitt’s wellborn wife, Charlotte, retraces the dangerous path that Clemency walked in the last months of her life, finding herself enmeshed in a sinister web that stretches from the lowest slums to the loftiest centers of power.

It is a most incredible sight: a corpse sitting at the reins of a hansom cab–and not just any corpse, but the body of a peer of the realm. To Inspector Thomas Pitt and his wife, Charlotte, this macabre apparition seems like sheer lunacy. Who would ever want to exhume a decently buried old chap like Lord Augustus Fitzroy-Hammond? A doctor insists that Lord Augustus’s death was natural. But as far as the police are concerned, there’s certainly nothing natural about any of this gristly aftermath. Inspector Pitt is determined to unearth the truth–even if the digging puts his own life at perilous risk.

When a group of powerful Irish Protestants and Catholics gather at a country house to discuss Irish home rule, contention is to be expected. But when the meeting’s moderator, government bigwig Ainsley Greville, is found murdered in his bath, negotiations seem doomed. Unless Superintendent Thomas Pitt and his wife, Charlotte, can root out the truth, simmering hatreds and passions may again explode in murder.

The stylish gentlemen of London’s Paragon Walk are suspects in a novel that “combines murder with a profile of the morals and manners of Victorian society” (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution). When innocent Fanny Nash of exclusive Paragon Walk dies in the arms of her exquisite sister-in-law, Jessamyn, Inspector Pitt is assigned to investigate her rape and murder. Every man of Paragon Walk is under suspicion, even Pitt’s brother-in-law, Lord George Ashworth, who was the last to have seen her. Could it be the charming, enigmatic Frenchman? Fanny’s cruel brother? Wealthy Dilbridge, who hosts wild, decadent parties? As Pitt digs deeper into the mystery, Paragon Walk’s aristocratic haughtiness gives way to fear, its calm to hatred. To keep her sister Emily, Lady Ashworth, company in this difficult time, inquisitive Charlotte once again finds herself in the midst of a deadly mystery. In the drawing rooms of her sister’s neighbors, Charlotte engages in witty and sharp-edged conversations that reveal unsavory intrigues and bitter rivalries. On Paragon Walk, Charlotte’s probing despite Thomas’s warnings may prove fatal.