Murder at Somerset House (Wrexford & Sloane, #9) by Andrea Penrose Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: hardcover, ebook, audiobook
Genres: historical fiction, historical mystery
Series: Wrexford & Sloane #9
Pages: 385
Published by Kensington on September 30, 2025
Purchasing Info: Author's Website, Publisher's Website, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Bookshop.org, Better World Books
Goodreads
Beyond the gilded ballrooms and salons of Regency London lurks a sinister web of intrigue and deception, and when a murder occurs during a scientific meeting at the Royal Society's stately headquarters at Somerset House, Lord Wrexford and Charlotte are the perfect pair to unravel it. But it aoon becomes clear that things are not what they seem . . .
A welcome interlude of calm has descended on Wrexford and Charlotte, though with three lively young boys in their care and an unconventional circle of friends and allies, quiet rarely lasts long. And sure enough, in the dead of night, an old acquaintance appears and asks for help. His brother-in-law has been accused of murdering a fellow member of the prestigious Royal Society at their London headquarters in Somerset House.
Wrexford agrees to investigate, and with a little unexpected help from their young charges, discovers that what seemed a simple crime of passion may be part of a far darker and dangerous plot, where science, money, and politics collide. A mysterious new technical innovation threatens to ignite a crisis throughout Europe, with frightening consequences for London’s financial world.
There is also personal upheaval for Wrexford and Charlotte, when a shocking secret from the past brings a profound change to their family, testing the bonds of loyalty and trust as never before . . .
My Review:
There’s a saying that “War is diplomacy by other means”. The converse is often applied as well, that “Diplomacy is war by other means”. It’s also been said that “War is hell”, so either way, references to hell are certainly applicable in both cases. Which leads straight into the motivations behind many of the characters in this mystery, as espionage is more than capable of being even more hellish than either war or diplomacy, particularly in the hands of a desperate despot doing his damndest to get his power back and keep it.
But that’s not where the story begins, as the whole point of the espionage in this story is to obfuscate and obscure where and when it starts. Because it begins with the death of an irascible engineer who claims to be able to demonstrate a device that will revolutionize the world and change the course of history and the tide of battle in favor of whoever gets there first.
The story, and the convoluted plot at its heart, relies on a complicated string of macguffins that rely on the lack of the very development that they initially claim has already been made and in the hands of Britain’s most capable enemy.
That development is instantaneous communication – and it did revolutionize the world when it came about three decades later as the telegraph. But this story, its central mystery, and all of the tasty red herrings and countless plots and counterplots within it, rely on the fact that the technology of the Regency Era and the Napoleonic Wars has not yet quite reached the point where the theory of telegraphy can be fully translated into a working device – even though it’s clear to the scientific community that the day is coming within their lifetimes.
But this story relies on that technology being teasingly close but not yet manifest. The opening death of the thoroughly unpleasant engineer/inventor Atticus Boyleston was designed to confound and confuse the powers that be on every level in Britain, as this story takes place during Napoleon’s exile on Elba, and the world is watching because no one with an ounce of either sense or prescience believes that the deposed Emperor of France is planning to remain graciously in exile.
So it begins with Wrexford, coerced by friendship and duty, investigating a murder he’d hoped to stay out of. Unaware that his wards, the ‘Weasels’ have already drawn him in while chasing the whereabouts of an escaped monkey from the Tower Menagerie.
But once Wrexford and his wife Charlotte, along with their eccentric, extended family are in, they’re all the way in. And up to their necks, as the agent provocateur behind the entire plot has decided to kill as many of them as he can reach along with any desire Britain might entertain to re-engage in another expensive war with a newly re-instated Bonaparte.
Escape Rating A: I feel like I came into this one a bit sideways, because as much as I love this series, and I absolutely do, what hooked me this time around began with the real-world historical implications and applications. Specifically, it was the stuff about the telegraph. It teased me greatly that I wasn’t certain whether or not this was a bit early for the actual introduction of telegraphy. I knew it was close, but didn’t think it was quite there yet.
Which sent me scurrying to look up the real history of telegraphy, and kept me focused there in spite of myself. Because it’s SO CLOSE in this story. Not just that the device was close to coming to life, but that the experts and inventors that Wrexford and Charlotte consulted in their investigation were mostly real historical figures who really were experimenting with the thing at the time. And the whole thing of being on the cusp but not being able to get over the top was beautifully handled in all of its many eccentricities.
Then the mystery got bigger, broader and even more complex, as the focus shifted from the not-yet-existent telegraph to the very real but still very much in its, well, maybe not the infancy but certainly the childhood, of the London Stock Exchange. And again, while the actual attempt to raid the market did not happen, the story does a terrific job of explaining how the early stock markets worked, introduced a fascinating real-life character in the person of economist David Ricardo, expanded the vastness of the plot as a whole, AND began what will become an ongoing part of the series by setting the ‘Weasels’ on their respective paths to adulthood.
And manages to add one more ‘weasel’ to the crew into the bargain. All of these developments bode very well indeed for future entries in the series.
Howsomever, in spite of the threat to the entire Wrexford clan, brood, and extended menagerie, the part of this story that had me glued to the pages was the historical background. The time in which this story is set, the ‘100 Days’ of Napoleon’s brief return to power, was a pivotal period in history and a fraught, taut, probably terrifying period where Britain and its people were on the brink of a war that no one wanted to go through again. The tension is palpable throughout the whole book.
And it’s ironic that so much of that tension can be laid at the feet of the device, or the lack thereof, that kicks the story off. So much of what happens, how the plot works and nearly succeeds, how it’s ultimately foiled, is dependent on events that have already happened but are not yet known, which highlights just how much instant communication did and still does change the world.
I was every bit as caught up in the waiting game as the characters were, even though I already knew the outcome. Which kept me cross-checking between the dates IN the story and the history to see where the stresses and strains were relative to the relief that was about to come.
I’ve frequently compared the Wrexford & Sloane series to the Sebastian St. Cyr series because they cover this same time period from slightly different angles – and that is especially true in this case. St. Cyr actually takes two books to cover this same set of historical circumstances, When Blood Lies and Who Cries for the Lost. And they are just as riveting as Murder at Somerset House. So if this series appeals to you, that will too, and very much vice versa.
This reader, at least, is very glad that the books in the St. Cyr series are usually published in the spring, and the books in this series publish in the fall – so I always have one to look forward to. Just as I’m already looking forward to the TENTH book in the Wrexford & Sloane series this time next year, to see what mystery they have to solve and what trouble the Weasels have managed to get themselves into!
