A literary obsession.
An angry young man with a gun.
And one woman trying to foil his deadly plan.
When Helen Oddfellow starts work as a lecturer in English literature, she's hoping for a quiet life after the trauma and loss of her recent past. But trouble knows where to find her.
There's something wrong with her new students. Their unhappiness seems to be linked to their flamboyant former tutor, Professor Petrarch Greenwood, who holds decadent parties in his beautiful Bloomsbury apartment.
When Helen is asked to take over his course on the Romantic poet William Blake, life and art start to show uncomfortable parallels. Disturbing poison pen letters lead down dark paths, until Helen is the only person standing between a lone gunman and a massacre.
As Helen knows only too well, even dead poets can be dangerous.
THE PEACOCK ROOM is the intriguing follow-up to the acclaimed 2018 mystery thriller UNLAWFUL THINGS, which introduced the London literary sleuth Helen Oddfellow.
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He weighed the weapon in his gloved hand, the heft of it reassuring. PROLOGUE
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(Independently Published, 8 October 2020, 290 pages, ebook, #ARC from the author and voluntarily reviewed, #BlogTour 8 October via @RandomTTours)
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I'd never heard of the author before so didn't know what to expect. The blurb sounded intriguing and I'm a fan of William Blake. I loved this book. It's was a breath of fresh air. I don't think I've read a murder mystery set in the literary world before so it was refreshingly different. I loved the setting and the characters, brilliantly written and brought to vivid life. I loved the author's use of literary illusions and imagery, especially of William Blake's work. It reminded me a lot of The Secret History by Donna Tartt. The book is quite gory at times but not OTT and it fits with the tone of the book. I had no idea who the killer was and loved the twists, turns and misdirection. I will read the first book at some point because this is a corker.
