By MICHELE HEWITSON
Who killed the handsome and well-connected barrister Charles Bravo? The year is 1876 and Bravo has been married for only four months to the elegant widow Florence Ricardo.
The marriage appeared to be happy. Bravo's end was not. He appeared to have taken poison but, in the 55 hours he took to die, he repeatedly denied this.
His death throes were attended by six doctors, including Queen Victoria's physician.
Death at the Priory is a true-crime story revisited from the 21st-century perspective. All the skirts are lifted from the table legs to reveal the dirty little secrets of the influential lurking under the furniture.
There was a fair bit of skirt-lifting at the time.
The coroner's inquest proved to be a popular entertainment. This was a sideshow in which adultery, misery, sodomy and booze made their riveting appearances.
But the case was never solved.
Ruddick reckons he's solved the mystery, at last. He's certainly written a thorough, if not exactly ripping yarn about a murder mystery which has it all.
Atlantic Books
$27.95
<i>James Ruddick:</i> Death at the Priory: Love, Sex and Murder in Victorian England
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