The HBS Author's Spotlight SHOWCASES Emma Jameson's New Book: Divorce Can Be Deadly.
Mystery Author Emma Jameson is the NYT bestselling author of the Lord & Lady Hetheridge series and the Dr. Benjamin Bones Mysteries.
Divorce Can Be Deadly
Dr. Benjamin Bones Mysteries Book 2
Author: Emma Jameson
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Two ghosts troubled Dr. Benjamin Bones. One he feared would never release him. Another he worried might slip away, however much he tightened his grip...
So begins the long-awaited second book in Emma Jameson's wartime cozy mystery series. Return to Birdswing, a tiny Cornish village, in the bitter winter of 1939 and revisit old friends as they embark on more amateur sleuthing. Lady Juliet is vexed by the return of her ne'er-do-well husband, Ethan Bolivar, while Ben's obsession with the Fenton House ghost deepens. When a bloodless, naked corpse is discovered in a great house in the nearby village of Barking, Ben and Juliet uncover lies, theft, illicit affairs, and a butler who just might have done it. Brimming with historical details and warm humor, Divorce Can Be Deadly is already being called "worth the wait!"
Excerpt from Divorce Can Be Deadly
A coal fire burned low beneath the elaborate mantel. Positioned before it sat Lord Dudley Maggart, one leg propped on a leather hassock. Without turning his head, he called in a rasping voice, “Who was at the door, Odette?”
“No one of consequence, darling.” Lady Maggart sounded unconcerned, but her heels clicked rapidly on the marble floor as she made a beeline for the room’s far door. Ben tried to step softly as he kept pace, but his footfalls seemed absurdly loud, as did Lady Juliet’s.
“Good Lord, woman. Hannibal’s elephants crossed the Alps more quietly than you.” Lord Maggart turned in his chair, probably to upbraid his wife, only to behold two strangers accompanying her and Mr. Collins.
“Great Scott!” Lord Maggart pointed a trembling finger at Lady Juliet. “That’s a rough sort of man to admit through the front door. Was the tradesman’s entrance nailed shut?”
“Lovely to see you again, Lord Maggart,” Lady Juliet called in her sweetest tone. “I’m not a tradesman or indeed a man at all. I’m Juliet Linton. Lady Victoria’s daughter from Belsham Manor.”
“Yes, don’t let the dirty trousers and mannish boots deceive you. It’s Lady Juliet, come to take tea.” Lady Maggart maintained her carefree tone. Had she become adept at lying to soothe her husband, Ben wondered. Or could she lie smoothly on a variety of topics?
“Lady Juliet. Yes, of course. Misplaced my specs. Useless things,” Lord Maggart said. His raspy inhalations made each sentence painful. “Well, now you’re here, don’t run away like thieves in the night. Come closer. I have a right to look over who’s traipsing through my house.”
Lady Maggart grimaced, but in a light voice, she said, “Naturally, darling,” and led them over.
At close range, Ben was struck by the baron’s frailty. If he’d gone over the top at the Somme, he was probably around Lady Maggart’s age, the middle forties. However, he looked sixty—a weak and wasted sixty. His cheeks were hollow, his forehead stacked with creases; his hair and mustache were pale gray. Bizarrely, given the time of day, he wore evening dress. White tie, no less, with a red carnation in his buttonhole.
“Collins,” Lady Maggart said, her pleasantness becoming strained. “Why in heaven’s name is the baron attired for dinner? Dudley, you know we don’t stand on ceremony these days.”
“Don’t berate the man,” Lord Maggart said. “I’ll wear what I please. Besides, the earl has always been one for the old observances. We’ll have a drink together in the library before Collins rings the bell.”
Lady Maggart shot Ben a glance that communicated two things. Her husband had dressed for a visitor who wasn’t coming, and this wasn’t the first time he’d muddled his dates or perhaps even his years.
Lord Maggart squinted at Lady Juliet. “Still unnecessarily tall, I see.”
“I fear so, my lord. Should I ever discover a remedy for excessive female stature, I’ll be sure to disseminate it far and wide.”
“What? Hm. See that you do.” Lord Maggart looked Ben up and down. In the pervasive gloom, he couldn’t be sure, but the whites of Lord Maggart’s eyes appeared yellow.
“Well? Out with it. Who the hell are you?”
“Benjamin Bones, Lord Maggart. Forgive my intrusion. I’ll try to be brief.”
“Brief? You’ll be brief, will you?” Lord Maggart harrumphed as only a blueblood could. “Damn generous, keeping your intrusion brief. What is your business, sir?”
Ben involuntarily glanced at his black leather bag, and Lord Maggart cried out as if struck.
“White coat! A white coat. Come to poke and prod me!”
“Dudley, calm yourself,” Lady Maggart cried.
“No bloody white coats in my house.” Lord Maggart shifted his elevated leg off the hassock with surprising speed. Fumbling beside his chair, he seized on a hardwood cane with a pewter grip, leaning on it as he got to his feet.
“I’ll teach you to go where you’re not wanted,” he roared, swiping wildly at the air with his cane. Lady Maggart gasped, but Ben easily stepped aside. He didn’t think the baron meant to land a blow so much as to frighten him. Handing his bag to Lady Juliet, he lifted his hands to prove they were empty.
“I’m not a physician, Lord Maggart.” A plausible fiction occurred to him. “I’m an undertaker.”
“An undertaker?” The baron stumped closer, leaning on his cane instead of brandishing it. His scleras were indeed yellow. So was his skin.
“I’m not dead yet, young man, however much these jackals may wish it,” Lord Maggart said. “Come to stake out your territory? What abominable cheek. Even if my wife invited you to measure me for my coffin.”
“Dudley. Please don’t be cruel in front of our guests.”
“In front of our guests,” he repeated to Ben. “That’s forbidden. Cruelty when guests are absent? Compulsory.”
Author Genre: Mystery & Thrillers
Website: Emma Jameson
Twitter: @msemmajameson
E-Mail: emmajamesonbooks@gmail.com
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Author Description: Emma Jameson is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the Lord & Lady Hetheridge cozy mystery series. Book #1, ICE BLUE, Book #2, BLUE MURDER, and Book #3, SOMETHING BLUE, are available now.
She is also the author of MARRIAGE CAN BE MURDER, the first book in a new series set in wartime Cornwall. She is at work on Lord & Lady Hetheridge book #4, BLACK & BLUE, and also DIVORCE CAN BE DEADLY, the second mystery starring Dr. Benjamin Bones.
Author's Book List
Dr. Bones and the Christmas Wish
Christmas Magic in Cornwall
A few days before Christmas 1939, Dr. Benjamin Bones is in a "Bah, Humbug," sort of mood. It's the coldest winter on record, his country is at war, and his love life has run aground. But magic as well as mysteries abound in Cornwall. When Ben makes a bargain with a elfin little man, it leads him to an old woman who longs to make amends--and a chance for Ben to show that certain someone how much he cares.
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Marriage Can Be Murder
- Dr. Benjamin Bones Mysteries Book 1Murder in Haunted Cornwall
On the eve of World War II, Dr. Benjamin Bones is at war with himself. While most young men are being sent away to fight the Germans, Ben is chosen to serve on English soil. Ordered to move to wild, beautiful Cornwall, he must trade his posh London office and stylish city life for the tiny village of Birdswing, population 1,221 souls. But leaving his home and shelving his career ambitions aren't the only sacrifices facing Ben. His unfaithful wife, Penny, is accompanying him to Cornwall in a last-ditch effort to save their marriage. But moments after their arrival, Penny is run down in the street, and Ben is almost fatally injured. And while the villagers assume Penny's death to be an accident, Ben quickly deduces it was murder.
As he convalesces in Fenton House, which the locals call haunted, Ben meets Birdswing's eccentric inhabitants. Mr. Gaston, the volunteer air warden, obsessed with defending his remote village against Nazi spies; Mrs. Cobblepot, a thoroughly practical housekeeper who believes in fairies; and Lady Juliet Linton, a prickly, headstrong aristocrat who won't take no for an answer. While adapting to life during Britain's "War at Home," a time of ration books, victory gardens, bomb shelters, and the Blackout, Ben sets about solving the mystery of Penny's murder--with a little help from Lady Juliet and the Fenton House ghost.
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Black & Blue
- Lord and Lady Hetheridge Mystery Series Book 4MURDER IN MAYFAIR
Modern art dealer Granville Hardwick has a way with people -- a way of making them wish he were dead. His London gallery is filled with works of questionable merit, his dating pool consists of other men's wives, and his home is the eyesore of a fine old neighborhood. The neighborhood of Scotland Yard's Chief Superintendent Tony Hetheridge, as a matter of fact. So when Hardwick turns up dead, bashed on the head by a rather tasteless reproduction, it's Hetheridge and his new bride, Kate, who embark on solving the case.
LORD & LADY HETHERIDGE
When he married Kate, Tony expected things to be different. But with Kate's ne'er-do-well relatives making trouble on the home front, and his own enemies attacking from within Scotland Yard, the case of the dead art dealer and three unfaithful wives might do more than change Mayfair. It might change Lord and Lady Hetheridge forever.
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Something Blue
- Lord and Lady Hetheridge Mystery Series Book 3Anthony Hetheridge, ninth baron of Wellegrave and chief superintendent for Scotland Yard, will marry Kate Wakefield in three weeks. It's inevitable--the invitations are out, the flowers are ordered, the cake is chosen. But murder waits for no man, and no wedding.
In London's prestigious West End, a disgraced CEO has been murdered at Hotel Nonpareil, an exclusive destination. No one, it seems, liked Michael Martin Hughes. Not his estranged wife, Thora, or his defiant son, Griffin. Not Hotel Nonpareil's manager, its head of security, or perhaps even the two most important women in Hughes's life: his future bride, Arianna, or his secret girlfriend, Riley. And before Hughes died, he incurred the wrath of none other than Sir Duncan Godington, longtime nemesis of both CS Hetheridge and DS Paul Bhar.
Hetheridge, Kate, and Bhar find themselves under tremendous pressure to uncover the killer as fast as possible. Have Scotland Yard and Downing Street lost confidence in Hetheridge? Find out as you return to the world of Ice Blue and Blue Murder in Something Blue, the third in the New York Times bestselling Lord & Lady Hetheridge mystery series.
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Blue Murder
- Lord and Lady Hetheridge Mystery Series Book 2Two Dead Men
In London’s fashionable Chelsea, a Halloween bash goes terribly wrong. Emmeline Wardle, daughter of a frozen foods baron, throws a party which results in the demise of two university schoolmates. Handsome golden boy Trevor Parsons is dead. So is pasty computer nerd Clive French. Both died on the Wardle estate within minutes of one another, and both died the same way – an axe to the skull. Given the social connections of all involved, New Scotland Yard sends a real baron to investigate: Chief Superintendent Anthony Hetheridge, also known as Lord Hetheridge, ninth baron of Wellegrave.
Two Prime Suspects
This time around, Detective Sergeant Kate Wakefield and her partner, Detective Sergeant Deepal “Paul” Bhar, have their work cut out. Bhar must contend with Emmeline Wardle, a spoiled blonde with a penchant for the finer things, including a certain illegal white powder. Kate must decide if Kyla Sloane, model-pretty and delicate, is being truthful about the events of that fateful night. And if Kyla’s connection to a former lover of Bhar’s means nothing – or everything.
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