Thirsty for more clues, Veronica and Stoker hear that a young Roma boy may know more about their first victim, but the only way to the boy is through an old acquaintance of Stoker’s, Lady Julia Brisbane. Lady Julia and her dashing husband, Nicholas, occasionally track down murderers and are only too happy to help. But as it becomes clear the secret society is a dangerous sect looking to entice immortality seekers, Veronica and Stoker find themselves ensnared by a decidedly more sinister couple.
The professed leader of the society claims to be a creature of the night; his partner practices witchcraft and they both fancy themselves emissaries of the otherworldly. Just as Veronica and Stoker get closer to learning the true purpose of the society and unraveling this macabre mystery, another body turns up, and they quickly discover they’ve gone from being the hunters to the hunted. . . .
Comment: This is the most recent installment in the Veronica Speedwell series. My buddy friend and I have enjoyed reading the books and, of course, we would want to read this one as well.
In this adventure, Veronica and Stoker are asked to help their friend Mornaday, a policeman, investigate the death of a man who seems to have been bitten by something and was found without any blood. This leads to folklore ideas, such as the vampire, but surely something more logical must have happened. In the meantime, clues take them to a mysterious man, Ruthven, who is seen by many as someone who deals with paranormal subjects. As they learn ore about this man and his past activities, the more sinister the situation becomes. Could it be that something bigger is actually going on?
Once again, I had a good time reading a book in this series. I think the author has achieved a point in which everything is stable and almost predictable in these books, which is comforting, and she has the extremely good element of writing this in a very appealing way.
In general, this was a good addition to the series, simply because it continues the ideas we saw in previous books and it does establish even more strongly the balanced relationship between Veronica and Stoker. They express their feelings in actions and sometimes in how they treat each other, but nothing here is supposed to focus on the romance of it, but my personal preference for romance novels surely fantasizes for what isn't there anyway.
The investigation they conduct here and the several adventures connected to it were interesting, as always, and well sequenced, in the sense that there is always something special to each detail and why it was used. I like this experience of having several little subjects mixed together and all somehow adding to the big picture, something I think is probably one of the author's best features. It was also intriguing to see why the paranormal elements would matter and how the scientific minds of Veronica and Stoker would work through decoding everything about it.
The resolution of the case was well done and offered food for thought, but it was also quite dramatic and, to me, a little sad. I just think the reasoning for the murder was mostly over sad issues than real killer instincts, but the author still found a way to make this a much more serious situation than what seemed at first. If one didn't care for reading in order, this is probably one of the installments I think works the best as an isolated story... although, of course, it is so much better and an more enriching experience to know the background of secondary characters and some references.
Perhaps, more or less in this vein, I can say that the element I was less motivated by was precisely this, that this story seems rather isolated, even bearing in mind how so much is related to previous stuff. It's just that, for me, even with all the positive things I liked, this story was a little predictable and for Veronica and Stoker it seems nothing major happened. I can't say i feel their arc advanced that much.
An interesting element was the presence of lady Julia and her husband, clearly there to bridge with the author's other investigative historical series (I suppose more romance centered). I got curious enough to feel I probably would enjoy reading that series as much I've been enjoying this one. Perhaps one day.
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