Flowers Stained with Moonlight - Tapa dura

"It's been four years since nineteenth-century Cambridge, England, schoolteacher Vanessa Duncan saved the man who was to become her fiance from the hangman's noose. Just when she is getting slightly bored with life, another mystery presents itself. Mrs. Bryce-Fortescue would like Vanessa to investigate her son-in-law's murder, as she is afraid her daughter, Sylvia, will be arrested for the crime. Vanessa leaps at the chance to go to Maidstone Hall and investigate, although her fiance is less enthusiastic . . . This epistolary mystery unfolds via Vanessa's chatty letters to her twin, Dora, Writing from Cambridge, Maidstone Hall, and Paris, Vanessa peppers the story with vivid details of Victorian life and times, comments on mathematical theory, and musings on the French Revolution."--Booklist"Catherine Shaw's work is something different.Inspired by Victorian literature and mathematics, she creates a powerfully driven story taking place in 1892 and not once losing the reader in historical anecdotes and/or explanations.Shaw's book is a rare treat."--Iloveamystery Newsletter

Four years have passed since Vanessa Duncan's life was turned upside down: a country girl fascinated with academia but unable to attend university, she moved to Cambridge to become a schoolmistress. Apart from missing her twin sister Dora, all appeared to be going well -- until a man she had befriended, Arthur Weatherburn, was accused of being a serial killer. Using her own powers of observation and intuition, and defying the social conventions of the late 1880s, Vanessa turned detective and discovered the true identity of the murderer, saving young Arthur Weatherburn's life. Vanessa's act of courage did not go unnoticed. When the mother of a suspected murderer turns up on her doorstep, Vanessa's talent for proving the innocence of the wrongly accused is again called upon. It seems that Mrs. Bryce-Fortescue's daughter, Sylvia, is suspected of killing her unaffectionate husband in the grounds of their manor home. But could the weak and apparently vulnerable Sylvia really be capable of such a crime? As Vanessa's investigation progresses, she is carried on a perilous journey from the beautiful English countryside to the bright lights of Paris. But with her intelligence and nerve pushed to the limit, will she be able to save the day again?