Thomas Clarady is recruited to spy on a group of radical Puritans at Cambridge University. Francis Bacon is his spymaster; his tutor in both tradecraft and religious politics. Their commission gets off to a deadly start when Tom finds his chief informant hanging from the roof beams. Now he must catch a murderer as well as a seditioner. His first suspect is volatile poet Christopher Marlowe, who … who keeps turning up in the wrong places.
Dogged by unreliable assistants, chased by three lusty women, and harangued daily by the exacting Bacon, Tom risks his very soul to catch the villains and win his reward.
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The other books with Sir Francis Bacon as a character were much more enjoyable than this one. Thomas Carady acts as an “intelligencer” for Bacon, trying to identify the ringleaders of the seditious Puritan movement. Unfortunately, the author spends a majority of the book on religious philosophy and Bible verses rather than on developing the plot of her mystery. One of the book’s highlights is the repartee between Thomas Carady and Christopher Marlowe.
Good Elizabethan series
Once I read the first in the series, I read everything else and now I’m just waiting for a new one to come out. I really enjoy both medieval and Tudor mystery series and this one is particularly good.
Loved the characters and the story. Learned some history to add to my load of trivia. I suggested it to friends
Thought provoking!
Actually I liked it. A lot. Not sure about the history time period but it was a fun read and did keep you asking who done it again and again. If you like clean language and a fun read, get it with this one.
As a midwestern teenager, I envied an older girl who left our small town to study in England. Oxford? Cambridge? Either destination was beyond my own aspirations, but delicious to imagine. This book tells of college life during the religious turmoil of the late 1500s. An ambitious young man, Thomas Clarady, uses his connection to an equally-ambitious and better-connected Francis Bacon, who assigns him to an undercover investigation of radical Protestants at Cambridge. His assignment is complicated when he finds the body of a roommate hanging in his lodgings. Not suicide, as attested by drugs in his wine. But who among the students and faculty tied the fatal knot? Who leads the Protestant dissenters – and will Tom be able to save himself and his new friends from disaster? Fans of British mysteries, especially Oxford/Cambridge junkies, will enjoy this view of old Cambridge.
I enjoyed this book, it’s the second in a series. I am enjoying the third in this series as well. It seems to be a good representation of the life in the 1500’s. that being said I will not be reading these again. They are a fun read to pass the time for a senior lady
Kept me interested all the way through.
Anna Castle’s Francis Bacon series is my go-to reading when the hyperbole of so many mysteries set in the present exceeds my limits. She always does her research and finds a way to blend it seamlessly into her plots and characters. Nothing hits the reader as contrived or screams, “This fact/expression/scene/relationship is important!” She treats her readers like thinking adults with a who enjoy subtlety more than hype and wit more than slapstick humor. Thomas Clarady the young spy who sometimes has trouble controlling his hormones and Francis Bacon, the brilliant spymaster who has more cards up his sleeve than a card shark, are the perfect couple. Using the two of them and her knowledge of history, Castle creates a rich world for the reader to enjoy from the comfort of his, her, of their own chair.
A good read!
I enjoyed the first in this series about Francis Bacon, and after a few months i read this second book. It was a bit difficult to re-orient myself into the time and remember who was who, and the change of locale didn’t help that. Once i got going though, i thoroughly enjoyed the story of Thomas Clarady as a spy infiltrating puritan fanatics. The research of these books feels authentic and instructive. Well done, again!
Very engaging. I love this period of history.
I love reading fictional stories about real people in history.
I enjoy all of the books in this series and this was no exception.
Good read, interesting history – church rivalry, class struggle, higher learning
Great book.
I love this author’s writing style and the way her mind works. Got me checking out all the real characters and reading about their lives and accomplishments. Really an excellent book. Cerebral but understandable, if you get my meaning. Makes you think but you know what she’s talking about.
I found this a bit tedious
Anna Castle has created a great historical mystery in her book Disputation. I love when an author takes a historical period and imbues it with characters of depth and conscious. They give everyday insight into these historical times. Well done Anna.