Sir Roger Shallot Books
A bizarre series of murders inside the court of Henry VIII is the center of this dramatic and colorful mystery in the tradition of Ellis Peters. In 1517 the English armies have defeated and killed James IV of Scotland at Flodden, and James's widow queen. Margaret, sister to Henry VIII, has fled to England, leaving her children behind and her crown under a Council of Regency. Sir Roger Shallot, a bon vivant with the sharpest wits and fastest legs in Christendom, and his friend Benjamin Daunbey, nephew to Cardinal Wolsey, are ordered to restore her to her throne. They encounter a murder conspiracy and bloody intrigue on every side. Dr. Selkirk, a half-mad physician imprisoned in the Tower, has information they need, but he is found poisoned in a locked chamber, guarded by soldiers, the only clue a poem of riddles. Other gruesome murders soon follow: at a haunted manor house in England; in the dark recesses of the Tower. The assassin is unknown, but always leaves a white rose - the mark of Les Blancs Sangliers, the secret society that plots the overthrow of the Tudor Monarchy.
Sir Roger Shallot and his scholarly master are sent to Paris at the behest of King Henry VIII to investigate the murder of British diplomat Richard Falconer
In 1522 the rogue Roger Shallot and his sober-sided master Benjamin Daunbey are sent for by Cardinal Wolsey. Stafford, Duke of Buckingham, has been arrested for treason and Benjamin and Roger are made to witness his bloody execution. The true reason for Buckingham's downfall soon becomes apparent: he was searching at Templecombe Manor and Glastonbury Abbey in Somerset for two precious relics -- the Holy Grail and Excalibur, the sword of King Arthur. Benjamin and Shallot are ordered to Templecombe, accompanied by the leaders of King Henry VIII's dreaded secret service, the Agentes in Rebus, to find these relics for the King. They must pit their wits against the Templars, a secret organisation plotting against the Tudors of which Buckingham may have been a part and who may still have a member of their society close to the crown. The difficulties that wily Shallot -- running true to his boast of possessing the fastest legs and quickest wits in Christendom -- has to face soon make their presence felt: a duel, blackmail, the curses of a witch, the grisly hand of glory, decapitated heads, mysterious fires -- and silent murder in the eerie Templar chapel. This novel was previously published under the pseudonym Michael Clynes.
In the spring of 1523, Cardinal Wolsey's "beloved" nephew, Benjamin Daunbey, and the latter's rapscallion servant, Roger Shallot, are summoned to London. A Florentine envoy, Lord Francesco Abrizzi, has been foully murdered in Cheapside. He has been shot in the head by a new-fangled hand cannon and King Henry VIII, the "Great Beast" of Shallot's memoirs, is determined to unmask the perpetrators of this outrage. In London, Shallot experiences King Henry VIII's rage and spite, the insults of the Abrizzis, and a murderous attack on his own life. Shallot, a born coward with the fastest legs in Christendom, just wants to crawl away and hide, but Henry VIII and Wolsey are most insistent: Shallot and Benjamin are to journey to Florence, discover the identity of Lord Francesco's assassin, deliver a secret message to Cardinal Guilo de Medici, Prince of the Church and ruler of Florence, as well as inveigle back to England a Florentine painter. It sounds simple enough - but the reality is murderously different: they experience murder onboard ship, pursuit by Turkish corsairs, the Satanic rites of a black magician, and bloodshed on every side.
When the feared royal executioners begin to die grisly deaths themselves, Sir Roger Shallot must investigate
A Tudor whodunnit in the series featuring Roger Shallot. Discovering a lucrative trade in true relics, including Bethlehem straw and Herod's tooth, Shallot becomes involved in the underhanded dealings of his King and Cardinal Wolsey, and the dark world of criminal London. From the author of THE GALLOWS MURDERS and THE GRAIL MURDERS.