Susanna Kearsley
Books: Mystery
Anthologies
The Deadly Hours (2020)
The Deadly Hours (2020) Susanna Kearsley, Anna Lee Huber, Christine Trent, C.S. Harris
Theses are four novellas, each connected by a cursed time piece.
- "Weapon of Choice" by Susanna Kearsley
- "In a Fevered Hour" by Anna Lee Huber
- "A Pocketful of Death" by Christine Trent
- "Siren’s Call" by C.S. Harris
"Weapon of Choice" by Susanna Kearsley
Set in Portofino, Italy in 1733
The anthology opens with Susanna Kearsley’s story with her characters Hugh and Mary, from her book A Desperate Fortune.
A storm and a purported curse forces their ship into port where they meet with a pirate and an assassin. The pirate has a gold watch, La Sirène, created from gold looted from the sacking of Cartagena, that is said (even by the pirate) to be cursed.
This was an interesting mystery (even if I saw the murder & mystery coming from a mile away) but I had some difficulty with the characters, since I had not read their book, an I felt like I was missing something at times.
Rating: 6.5/10
It was a very interesting idea, and for the most part I enjoyed seeing the way the stories wove bits and pieces into each other. I just wish the third story had been stronger, since it drug down the rest of the anthology.
Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press
Rating: 7/10