Foxe and the Moon-Shadowed Murders by William Savage

Happy Monday! I’m featuring Foxe and the Moon – Shadowed Murders by William Savage today. Please enjoy an excerpt for a peek inside the book!

About the Book:

The Reverend, the Honourable Henry Pryce-Perkins, to give him his full title, was the youngest son of a peer of the realm and a brilliant scholar at Oxford. After ordination, the Bishop of Norwich appointed him Warden of St. Steven’s Hospital, until such time as he could be found a suitably large and prestigious parish. Now he has been found murdered outside his own house, and the bishop and mayor expect Foxe to give all his time and attention to discovering who did it.

A day or so later, a call from the street children sends Foxe hurrying to the death of a young woman, whose richly-dressed body has been found in a reputedly haunted house at the entrance to one of Norwich’s notorious ‘yards’: clusters of wretched tenements housing the poorest people in the city. 

Needless to say, Foxe can’t stop himself from getting involved in this new mystery as well. Now he’s facing two complex investigations, while a personal crisis is also brewing, involving the latest woman in his life. Can Foxe concentrate on finding the murderers and bring them to justice, while disentangling himself from a relationship rapidly going sour? What about his two past loves, both seemingly eager to take up where they left off and about to arrive back in Norwich? 

As the complications continue to pile up, Ashmole Foxe will need to display even more cunning and determination than usual, if he hopes to solve the mysteries, untangle the knots in his personal life and return to a more stable existence.

 

Excerpt:

As he walked home, Foxe mulled over this new mystery in his mind. Who would wish to kill a young clergyman, especially one who was a member of the nobility? It wasn’t unusual for peers of the realm to despatch third or fourth sons into the church as a suitable way of gaining an income for life in a respectable way. Who was the Earl of Westleton anyway? Foxe thought he knew of all the members of the nobility who lived close to Norwich, but he’d never heard of this one. Ah well, the bishop’s secretary ought to be able to enlighten him. He’d have to be patient until later in the day.

Foxe had never been inside the bishop’s palace before and so had been at a loss over what to expect. It turned out to be a commodious and elegant dwelling of fairly modern design. The walls of the hallway were finished with fine plasterwork and adorned with some remarkably good paintings. The butler had told him that the room where he was to meet the bishop’s secretary was the study. To Foxe’s mind, no finer study was likely to exist in the home of any Norfolk gentleman. Not only were its walls panelled in oak in the style known as linen-fold, there were tall bookshelves either side of the large carved fireplace. The furniture was also of a most superior kind, with richly patterned walnut and deeply coloured mahogany, the most prevalent of the woods on display. Foxe’s eyes were also drawn to the Chinese porcelain vases on the mantel, the huge long-case clock in one corner and the long windows looking out onto a view towards the river and the Bishop’s Bridge beyond.