Ursula Marlow, Clare Langley-Hawthorne's sleuth in The Serpent and the Scorpion, reminds me a lot of Valeria Woodville who you might remember me mentioning not too long ago. Valeria is Wilkie Collins' heroine in The Law and the Lady. Both are feisty, independent women, intelligent and willing to go out on a limb to uncover the truth. The only difference, and I'd call it progress since about forty years separate the two, Ursula is willing to go things alone without the aid or approval of a man. As a matter of fact she's come a long way from Valeria's world, as she tries hard to shrug off Society's expectations of what's proper for a woman of her station, this means--marriage. Part of what Ursula struggles with in this novel is how to reconcile her independence with her relationship with Oliver Wrotham, but I'm getting way ahead of myself here.
I was introduced to Ursula Marlow in Consequences of Sin, which I happened upon at the public library last year. Ursula was not a very traditional young woman. Raised by her father, the wealthy owner of several textile mills, she wasn't your usual uppercrust Edwardian woman. Not only was Ursula Oxford educated but a suffragette as well. And to top it all off she became involved in a murder investigation. Although her actions did and do raise the eyebrows of Society, in not so short a time the world will be thrown into chaos, so her actions only anticipate the coming change. I knew I liked her from the start.
A year later Ursula is a bit wiser but now alone after the death of her beloved father. She's in charge of the textile business that he so carefully built into the small empire that it's become, and Ursula works hard to see its continued success. Unfortunately there are those who'd like nothing more than to see her fail. Business takes Ursula to Egypt where she witnesses the murder of her friend, Katya Vilensky, and once again she finds herself mixed up in the solving of the crime. Things become more complicated when a young woman dies in a fire in one of Ursula's textile mills, and there are signs the deaths may be related. To make matters worse an ex-lover enters the picture, and Ursula's not sure where his loyalties lie.
Langley-Hawthorne hit the ground running in this second installment. Some mystery authors need a little time to get things going and build up steam, but I've not found that to be the case here. I was impressed right from the beginning, and she surpassed herself in The Serpent and the Scorpion. As with Jacqueline Winspear, it's not just the mystery aspect of the novel that drew me in, but reading about Ursula's milieu, which felt quite real and believable. This time around the mystery wasn't just your usual "whodunit", but verged on international intrigue, which really works for the period she writes about.
Oh, and Lord Wrotham? To those who don't know him, he seems rather stiff and wooden, but then they don't know him like Ursula does. Oliver Wrotham was Ursula's father's lawyer and upon his death became trustee of the family fortune. There was a spark between Ursula and Lord Wrotham in the first book, but the spark has ignited and become something a bit more this time around. It's a nice touch and well done.
I know it's a cliché, but I'm going to say it anyway. The Serpent and the Scorpion is a real page-turner that gripped me from the first paragraph. It's not often that I (literally) want to go straight back to the first page after I turn the last one, but I could happily have done so this time. Instead I've splurged and bought Consequences of Sin, so instead I'll begin at the beginning once more. Things have been left hanging, so I'll have to wile away the time somehow until Clare Langley-Hawthorne writes more!