When fiction becomes fatal, an apothecary must untangle a murder written before it happened.
Christmas, 1857. London is glowing with candlelight—and hiding a killer in plain sight.
Apothecary Clara Wetherly already has her hands full: a struggling Bloomsbury shop, a grandmother’s ghost who won’t stop rearranging the shelves, and Inspector Graham Redgrave, whose visits bring more than murder into her carefully ordered life.
Then celebrated publisher Philip Hartwick is found dead at his desk. The coroner rules it natural causes—until Clara’s friend, aspiring novelist Harriet Collins, makes a terrifying discovery. The murder mirrors her rejected manuscript exactly. Same victim. Same method. A hatpin to the base of the skull, hidden where no one would think to look.
Now Harriet is the prime suspect in a crime she only committed on paper.
With the help of her imperious ginger cat Marmalade, a sharp-witted circle of lady investigators, and a reluctant inspector torn between duty and doubt, Clara plunges into the cutthroat world of Victorian publishing. Stolen royalties. Bitter authors. A wife who runs the business. A mistress with expensive tastes. Everyone had a reason to want Hartwick dead.
But only one person turned fiction into fatal reality.
As the clock ticks toward the gallows, Clara must uncover who read the manuscript—and who was clever enough to use another woman’s imagination as the perfect cover for murder.
Featuring a slow-burn romance, a meddlesome ghost, found family sleuths, and a cat convinced he’s solved the case already, Murder by Manuscript is a Victorian cozy mystery perfect for readers who love gaslight intrigue with heart.
