When Falcons Fall: A Sebastian St. Cyr Mystery

Harris’s strong 11th Regency whodunit (after 2015’s Who Buries the Dead) takes nobleman Sebastian St. Cyr to Shropshire in 1813. Two years earlier, Sebastian learned that he was a bastard. Recently, he met Jamie Knox, who may have been his half-brother, but Jamie was shot dead in London by someone who was aiming for Sebastian, and Sebastian has now taken it on himself to deliver a present to Jamie’s grandmother in the village of Ayleswick-sur-Teme. There he’s recruited by the callow local squire, Archie Rawlins, after a woman’s body is discovered in a meadow. The presence of an empty bottle of laudanum near the corpse leads the constable to consider the death self-inflicted, but Archie has his doubts, which Sebastian is able to validate. The victim is identified as Emma Chance, a widow who just arrived in the village. The presence in the area of Napoleon Bonaparte’s renegade brother Lucien enhances the intricate murder puzzle. Agent: Helen Breitwieser, Cornerstone Literary. (Mar.)