Customer Reviews

Death at Rottingdean

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4 star:		(1)
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When the fourth Baron of Somersworth dies, his brother Charles Sheridan must hastily return home to assume the title's responsibilities. Charles' Irish-American spouse Kate accompanies her beloved mate. However, her efforts to become a successful Baroness lead to her miscarriage and inability to have children any longer. Concerned about Kate's mental state, Charles takes her on a vacation in the coastal town of Rottingdean, just outside Brighten.

When the distraught couple arrives at the vacation hot spot, a coast guard is killed and a second death shortly follows. The Prince Regent orders Charles to investigate the two killings. Very quickly, the married couple concludes that most of the townsfolk are engaged in illicit smuggling with the contraband stored beneath the city. However, the activities go way beyond the local level as they threaten the health of the entire empire.

DEATH AT ROTTINGDEAN is a mesmerizing story line that has seemingly endless excitement. Set in late Victorian England, readers glimpse a country still struggling with the impact of the industrial revolution. Science and technology seems to advance at a rate similar to today's information technology revolution. Still, the old class system remains viable and alive. Robin Paige provides fans with an excellent historical mystery that will have genre fans searching for the previous four fabulous novels in this special, one-of-a-kind series.

Harriet Klausner

Loved the story , maybe I am being biased for I am lucky enough to live in Rottingdean. I was able to read the story while sitting by the village pond & on the beach.The historical research into the area is first class. Great read for the Summer or a seaside holiday.

I love this series. Not only are the stories well told but I love how the books include real authors from the period in the story lines. This is usually done with fairly minor characters but Rudyard Kipling plays a major role in this book. The books are also very well researched and in this particular book I learned a great deal I had never known before about the smuggling that went on in England. These mysteries are also very family friendly. I would recommend them to anyone.

This is an excellent addition to the Kathryn and Charles series. In this book we find out about another aspect of Victorian England - smuggling and other nefarious schemes. There are actually two storylines in this book, and the authors deal with both of them very well. They certainly keep their readers interested. I like the obvious research that goes into each one of these books, and the totally different view that we are given about life in England just before the turn of the last century. The books are always enteratining and we get a history lesson too.

I won't bore you with a recap of what was already stated so well by the reviewer Harriet Klausner. I do want to take the time to assure readers that in this delightful late Victorian era series attention to period detail is rivaled only by attention to excellent characterization, believable dialogue, honest settings, and strong plot. Buy the book, you won't regret the money spent.

I can be a binge reader. I discover a new author I like, and go on a tear to read every book in a series, perhaps every book the author wrote. I'm currently lost in the historical mysteries of Robin Paige (which is a husband-and-wife team... if they're going to be open about that, why have a nom de plume?), set in 1890s England, most of which have a few "real" people in at least walk-on parts. What's not to like?

The first book in the series, Death at Bishop's Keep, set up our characters: American Kate, who writes mysteries under the pseudonym Beryl Bardwell, and Lord Charles Sheridan, who is fascinated by newfangled forensic science (wow, fingerprints!) and a rather serious photographer. It's obvious from the first that they're meant to be together. By this point, in book 5, Charles has inherited the family estate and responsibilities, and the couple is exhausted by London. So they take a holiday in the seaside town of Rottingdean... where NATURALLY there is a dead body, and NATURALLY (with an entirely plausible reason) Charles and Kate must discover whodunnit. Our real-life characters are Rudyard Kipling and his family, including Aunt Georgina Burne-Jones (an independently-minded woman and active socialist, tied to the William Morris school).

I liked Death at Rottingdean. I like all these characters. I didn't make the right guesses in regard to the mystery, which is always a good sign, too. Especially, I appreciate the historical detail -- even when it isn't pretty. We get a glimpse at the uncomfortable bits of Victorian life, for instance, when the dead man's widow learns she must leave her home; Aunt Georgie's socialist suggestions seem harsh even though the character is well-meaning. It's a reminder that not all of Victorian life is silk dresses and upper-class holidays.

Somehow, this book wasn't quite as page-turning as earlier books in the series. Maybe it's because I'm less familiar with Kipling-the-person than I was with Beatrix Potter (in Death at Daisy's Folly); it might be my own distractions (how DARE my real life interfere with my reading?!). I liked the book; I didn't swoon over it. That won't stop me from grabbing the next book in the series, though, because I absolutely want to know what derring-do Charles and Kate take on next.

I enjoy this series because so much research is invested in them, and it shows. The authors manage to bring a great deal of historic detail to their work, bringing actual events into the story to make it more plausible. Here the author Rudyard Kipling and his family, including his aunt, the social activist wife of a famous painter, are introduced to the reader in the small town of Rottingdam. The actual town's history of smuggling activity is woven into a very plausible plot of murder and intrigue which is resolved by the sleuthing duo Lord and Lady Sheridan with the help of a small boy and the famous author.

Although I usually have some difficulty divining the culprit because of the abundance of red herrings that twist through the plots of these works, I was already well on the culprit's trail this time. Knowing--or at least suspecting--the guilty party in no way detracted from my enjoyment of the work, however. As with any well crafted panopoly of characters and colorful settings, the "visit" is what makes the whole work worth while.

At the end of the last book of this series, Sir Charles and his wife Kate were happily residing at Kate's ancestral home at Bishop's Keep. In the interval between that book and this one, Sir Charles' brother has died and the couple is now Lord and Lady Sheridan. Being the fifth Baron of Somersworth has placed a great deal of added responsibility on the couple's shoulders not the least of which is Lord Charles' seat in the House of Lords. While in London, the pregnant Kate ventures into the slums to aid in the care of the sick and becomes sick herself. Not only does Kate almost die but she also faces a far different future based on the permanent physical damage caused by the disease. Her feelings about this change in circumstances are bottled up inside as are the feelings of her husband and this background story ends up playing a large role in the plot as a whole.

Lord Charles has promised Kate a holiday away from London where they can spend time together like they did before Charles inherited all of these new responsibilities. They head for Rottingdean, a little village on the Channel taking along only Amelia and Lawrence, their two most valued servants. They arrive just after the body of a Coast Guard has washed up on the beach, a death the local constable writes off as a suicide. Soon another Coast Guard is found shot and by a gun the likes of which Charles has never seen. Unfortunately for Charles, he is at a party with the Crown Prince when news of the second death arrives. Remembering the bang up job Charles had done in a previous investigation that saved the Crown a great deal of embarrassment, His Royal Highness put Lord Charles in charge of the case. So much for their quite holiday!

Charles and Kate are soon hard at work and slowly they begin to uncover what seems to be a vast conspiracy. A conspiracy that at face value doesn't make any sense at all. They are aided immensely by a local boy named Patrick who knows far more than he is willing to tell at first. He is after all quite fond of some of the people who are very deeply involved in the conspiracy. I have a feeling that we will see more of Patrick in future books.

Besides the Prince, the other historical figure who shows up in this book is the famous author Rudyard Kipling, who also aids the investigation a great deal. The appearance of these real people in this series adds a greatly to the stories as does the very realistic atmosphere. The authors are to be commended for their skill in story telling and their willingness to do a lot of research to make everything so believable. These stories are so realistic that while reading a previous book in which the characters must have drank gallons of tea, I started craving tea and had to break out the Earl Gray. In this book they drank lemonade and I ended up sending to the store for some of that. It takes a very talented storyteller to take a reader that deeply into a story. This is just a marvelously fun and suspenseful book that will keep you glued to it's pages from beginning to end.

Kate and Charles Ardleigh take what they hope will be a relaxing vacation in the small coastal town of Rottingdean. But after two Coast Guards are murdered, the Prince of Wales sends them to investigate. It doesn't take long before they realize that smuggling in involved. With the help of Rudyard Kipling, they soon realize how many secrets the seemingly quaint and quiet town is hiding.

I enjoyed this book in the series. It's not too preachy, lots of atmosphere, and the suspense doesn't let up! Just great.

This is the sixth in a series of cozy mysteries written by a husband and wife team under a pseudonym. Set in Victorian England, they are well-written and well-researched. Each book has historical person or event that is intertwined in the storyline, making it of particular interest to those who enjoy their history. The historical notes found at the end of the book delineate the author's reasons for the inclusion of that person or event. Replete with period detail and the social mores evocative of a bygone era, this is a series of historical mysteries that is well worth reading.

Lady Kathryn and her husband, Charles, now the Baron of Somersworth, are taking a much needed holiday at Rottingdean, a quaint seaside village that used to be known for its smuggling proclivities. Their days of rest and relaxation are numbered, however, when the body of a coast guard is discovered on the beach. They soon suspect that the old smuggling trade may not have gone quite out of fashion and that the townspeople are not so ignorant of what is really going on. With the aid of their friend, an author named Rudyard Kipling, Kathryn and Charles are intent upon setting to right what has gone terribly wrong in Rottingdean.

The main characters are engaging, and with each passing book, the reader becomes more fully engaged with their lives. As with all cozy mysteries, it is not so much the mystery that is of import but the characters that revolve around the mystery. While the mystery is intriguing, it is simply the framework around which the characters evolve. This is definitely a cozy historical mystery series that is a must read for all those who enjoy this genre.