Murder at Hatfield House by Amanda Carmack is, as the title suggests, an historical mystery featuring an amateur sleuth – a female musician, Kate, who is tasked with/takes it upon herself to solve the gruesome deaths occurring around Hatfield House. Hatfield House being the place where the young Princess Elizabeth was placed under house arrest by her sister, Queen Mary.
Set in 1558, in the months before Elizabeth ascends to the throne, suspicion between the Protestant Princess and her Catholic half-sister and the forces that align on either side of them are thick and plots abound. When the servant of an envoy of the queen’s, the obnoxious Lord Braceton, sent ostensibly to find heretics being shielded by Elizabeth, is killed, the envoy determines that the princess and her household must be guilty.
As other bodies appear and mistrust grows and the envoy’s bullying tactics to elicit confessions reach new heights, Elizabeth employs Kate to act as her spy and try and seek out those responsible for the horror. Aligning herself with her friend, the lawyer Matthew, a handsome actor, and various servants of the princess, Kate must risk life and limb to not only stop more of her friends dying and the princess being put at risk, but to protect the future of her country as well.
I had mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand, I really enjoyed the setting and timing of the novel and felt this was well done – the political and religious tension, the finger-pointing, and even the vulnerability of the young Elizabeth who, despite being feisty, was at the whim of her sister’s good grace. On the other, I found Kate, while clever and kind, was too modern for the era in the sense of what she was able to do (wander the countryside unescorted, disappear and roam all over houses, and even in her friendship with Matthew etc). Some of her actions also belied her intelligence and I wanted to shout at her not to be so stupid as to put herself at such obvious risk. I understand characters do have to do perilous things, build narrative tension and show their heroic stripes, but really, sometimes Kate was just a dolt.
The ending was also strange. When the big expose comes, the “who dunnit” if you will, though I half-expected it, the reasoning didn’t seem sound. I thought, somehow I’d misread something and went back to reread the part before – but no, it was as is and, for some reason, I found it didn’t sit as well as I’d hoped.
Overall, however, despite these misgivings, I did enjoy the book.
The Tudor Secret, we find Queen Mary upon the throne and negotiations for her marriage well under way. Our hero, Brendan Prescott, and his love, Kate are embedded in Elizabeth’s household at Hatfield. Not for long. Summoned by William Cecil, Brendan has no choice but to journey to London and find employ at the royal court, feigning an allegiance to Queen Mary, the woman he once helped. Though he is sympathetic towards Queen Mary, Brendan is really at court to protect the Princess Elizabeth from the plots and cunning of not only the Spanish delegation, but even Elizabeth’s so-called friend and Brendan’s former employer, Robert Dudley who, though locked in the tower, appears to be manipulating events. With the Spaniards determined to indict Elizabeth for treason and deliver a death sentence and the Dudley’s working for their own ends, Brendan has his work cut out.
