[In the following review, Melton lauds Perry's Farrier's Lane.]

Perry's Thomas and Charlotte Pitt mysteries, set in Victorian London, are a long-running success on the historical whodunit circuit. In the duo's thirteenth adventure [Farrier's Lane]. Thomas is investigating the murder of a prominent judge, a crime he feels is linked to the macabre Farrier's Lane murder. A young Jew, Aaron Godman, was hanged for the Farrier's Lane crime some years before, but the murdered judge, who heard Godman's final appeal, seemed to be considering reopening the case. The evidence in both murders is frustratingly difficult to uncover and the witnesses strangely reluctant to talk. The stymied Pitt is under pressure from his superiors to solve the judge's murder quickly and leave the earlier case buried. It's Charlotte to the rescue, proving that a wife's social contacts are as valuable as a copper's badge. Perry is wonderfully adept at depicting the customs, manners, morality, fashions, and speech of Victorian London. Her characters are authentically and appealingly drawn, and her plot is sinister, gripping, and intense, with a surprising but satisfying ending. Like the earlier entries in the series, this is certain to be popular with fans of historical mysteries.