Who Buries the Dead

The decapitation of a wealthy plantation owner at London's Bloody Bridge in 1813 draws Sebastian St. Cyr into an investigation that connects to the beheading of King Charles I in 1648, via an aged coffin strap found near the body. The victim's connection to the current Home Secretary brings Sebastian's father-in-law Lord Jarvis into the investigation with his own agenda, and the trail leads from the worst slums of Fish Street Hill to Mayfair ballrooms and eventually to the brother of a quietly brilliant spinster named Jane Austen.

Davina Porter navigates the novel's wide social canvas with authority, making the transition from aristocratic drawing rooms to genuine poverty vivid in both registers. The historical murder mystery nested inside the contemporary investigation gives the novel unusual structural depth, and Porter handles the accumulating suspects without losing the central momentum. At just over ten and a half hours, this tenth Sebastian entry demonstrates the series at full strength.