A Willing Victim

It’s 1956 and the world is in turmoil—the Bikini Atoll, the Suez Crisis, the Hungarian Uprising—these are just some of the events Inspector Ted Stratton can’t help but think about as he makes his way through a murder investigation. The murder victim is a young man in London whose bookshelves are filled with literature on spirituality and esoteric religions, and who had just recently left the Foundation for Spiritual Understanding, a New Age cult based in Suffolk. Traveling to Suffolk to investigate, Inspector Stratton encounters a community of fervent believers led by an enigmatic, charismatic leader, and a femme fatale with a shady past. As well as a twisty murder mystery, Laura Wilson's A Willing Victim is a portrait of England in the mid-fifties and a meditation on the dangerous power of faith. It is the best kind of historical mystery; as UK publication The Independent writes, “Wilson is as adroit at the straightforward mechanics of the crime mystery as she is at evocative prose shot through with a keen sense of the past.”