Review: Revelation

Sansom’s fourth Matthew Shardlake mystery finds the hunchback lawyer investigating a serial killer who takes his grisly inspiration from the Bible in an era of increasing religious acrimony.

It’s spring 1544. Fat and ailing Henry VIII has rid himself of his fifth wife and is wooing a sixth, Lady Catherine Parr, who has Protestant sympathies. Although Henry repudiated the Catholic Church in his insistence on a divorce, he has become more sympathetic to the old ways. Reformers are worried.

Most recently Henry has arrested London butchers suspected of selling meat during Lent, and rousted their Lent-breaking clientele. In an age when religious disagreement is a capital offense, this is worrisome.

And Matthew is afraid for the life of his newest client, a teen whose manic praying has landed him in Bedlam. If Shardlake can’t cure him or prove him hopelessly insane, the boy will be burned at the stake as a heretic.

Then the murder of a close friend draws him into a case that could shake the country and Shardlake is once again called to aid Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury, a moderate reformer. Although the political threat seems tenuous at first, it grows with each succeeding murder, as it becomes clear that the killer is a religious zealot, acting out a section of the Book of Revelation.

Absorbing, intelligent and suspenseful, this is a series for readers who want their mysteries embedded in fully fleshed-out novels, full of sights, sounds, smells and ideas. The characters – Shardlake’s blunt assistant Barak and his wife Tamasin, his Moorish ex-monk physician friend Guy Malton – continue to develop and draw readers into their lives.

The murders are particularly horrific (even I, bloodthirsty mystery fan that I am, had to skim over a few descriptions) and the ending pulls out all the stops, but it’s the detailed, unromanticized depiction of Tudor life that really captivates.

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Lynn Harnett

Please Note: Books reviewed are usually provided by the publisher, author, or an agent. Reviewers usually get to keep the book.

Book Review: Revelation

Please Note: Books reviewed are usually provided by the publisher, author, or an agent. Reviewers usually get to keep the book.