A darkly comic mystery that transplants Harriet Smith, the gullible sidekick turned private investigator of Jane Austen’s Emma, into the uncanny world of Northanger Abbey to solve…a horribly haunting murder.
Harriet Smith, once the naïve companion of Jane Austen’s Emma, is now a private detective for hire. But she’s not in the pastoral village of Highbury anymore. She’s found herself in the dark, bustling world of Northanger Abbey, where the line between gothic imagination and real danger is thinner than anyone would like.
When the Master of Ceremonies at the Bath Upper Rooms invites Harriet to investigate a theft, it seems straightforward enough. Until she catches the thief in the act and finds him moments later with a dagger in his chest.
As the winter season unfolds through candlelit plays and glittering balls, Harriet’s suspects multiply. A cunning militiaman. A resentful actor. A seductive society beauty and her devoted brother. The rest of their family whose respectability feels decidedly theatrical. And maybe even the theater’s rumored spectre.
Ghost stories swirl, scandals ferment, and Harriet starts to believe that someone is staging more than just a performance. With her long suffering-partner Robert Martin in tow, Harriet must navigate deception and desire while resisting the temptation to see villains lurking behind every curtain.
