A serial killer in Whitechapel!

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Murder by Lamplight (A Dr. Julia Lewis Mystery #1) by Patrice McDonough         

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️


A feisty female doctor, and an emotionally wounded Crimean soldier, now a Detective Inspector with Scotland Yard.  A serial killer stalking victims in Victorian London, seemingly centered around the Whitechapel area. Targeted, mutilated victims who all have to have some sort of link but what it is has Detective Inspector Tennant and his constables floundering, playing catch-up. 

Dr. Julia Lewis and Tennant first meet over a body and an autopsy. All clues point towards a Whitechapel connection but the clues are mired in nursery rhymes. The perpetrator taunts the Inspector with Notes written in purple ink. Along the way he targets Dr. Julia!

McDonough gives us a more than thorough background look at life for the ordinary person at this time (maybe too much) Cholera and typhus are rampant, work house conditions disgustingly rabid, and the lives of those living in these areas less than sanitary.

With these living conditions somehow central, with more victims appearing, the doctor and the inspector race to find the killer. What do the victims have in common?

Inspector Tennant has his superior, Chief Inspector Clark, demanding the impossible. It seems he feels Tennant was foisted upon him. Tennant and his men are run ragged trying to solve the murders and keep their chief happy. Well, keep Tennant in his position also.

The end was totally surprising!

I’m looking forward to more from this debut author.


A Kensington Books ARC via NetGalley.                                              

Many thanks to the author and publisher.

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