L.C. Tyler
A Cruel Necessity
John Grey #1
$ 9.99
Two-time Edgar nominee LC Tyler is best known for his series featuring Ethelred and Elsie—a third-rate novelist and his gloriously vulgar agent, respectively. And so he should be: He’s twice won Britain’s “Last Laugh” award for the Best Humorous Mystery of the Year. But with A Cruel Necessity, the first in the John Grey historical mystery series, Tyler takes a sharp turn into the shadows. There are still some chuckles to be had, but not many: This is England in the year 1657, Oliver Cromwell is in power, and joy has essentially been outlawed. A young lawyer with a taste for beer and pretty women, Grey finds pleasures enough, even in this backwater Essex town, but he’d be wise to keep his amusement to himself: A Royalist spy has been found dead in a local ditch, and Cromwell’s agents are eager—distressingly eager—to explain to Grey that this is nothing to laugh about.
"Tyler juggles his characters, story, wit and clever one-liners with perfect balance."—The Times (UK)
Who's likely to like this: Fans of Lindsey Davis's Rebels & Traitors and Iain Pears's An Instance of the Fingerpost
2016 • Fiction/Mystery • 304 pages • ISBN: 9781631941047
