{"id":5752,"date":"2016-03-26T10:14:22","date_gmt":"2016-03-26T14:14:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/?p=5752"},"modified":"2025-10-01T17:03:41","modified_gmt":"2025-10-01T21:03:41","slug":"banquet-of-lies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/5752","title":{"rendered":"Banquet of Lies"},"content":{"rendered":"

Banquet of Lies<\/a><\/em> (2013) Michelle Diener<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Set in London in 1812<\/p>\n

Giselle Barrington is the daughter of a folklorist with a fascination for cooking. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do you do with the recipes?\u201d The woman looked genuinely interested now. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m compiling a reference work of dishes from the cultures of Europe. But mainly I follow them.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cFollow them . . .\u201d Confused, the woman looked around the crowded room, as if the people swirling around them could help her. \u201cHow?\u201d <\/p>\n

Gigi smiled. \u201cThe usual way. In the kitchen.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cYou make the dishes?\u201d The woman tapped Gigi on the arm with her fan. \u201cWith the servants?\u201d Her voice was a squeak. <\/p>\n

\u201cWith the chef who has accompanied us for the last ten years.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cAh.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Her father is a noble with a fascination for folklore, so as he travels collecting folk stories, he often carries secret messages for the crown.<\/p>\n

She had a strange sense, as they helped her along, that her plight was like that of a girl in one of the folktales her father collected.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

When Gigi witnesses the murder of her father by and Englishman, she knows that the message she was holding for him is terribly important, and she needs to get it back to England to pass on the message, but she has no idea who she can trust with the message.<\/p>\n

Lord Aldridge inherited his position upon the death of both his father and his older brother, so after being called back from the war, he does occasional work for the Foreign Office. He is also a neighbor of Sir Barrington, and has been looking for a French Chef.<\/p>\n

This book was damn near perfect for me. It’s got cooking, folklore, and a fascinating mystery.<\/p>\n

I’m not quite sure how I managed to pick two books in a row where the heroines were cooks, but it caused me to spend the past two days constantly wanting to get up and go into the kitchen, and then remembering I have no brioche or gallettes.<\/p>\n

Sadly.<\/p>\n

The mystery was extremely well done. Giselle held the documents for her father, but knew absolutely nothing of his business with the Crown, and truly had no idea who she could trust, other than the chefs she grew up with, and so it was both logical and reasonable for her to hide in the kitchen as a chef.<\/p>\n

She’s a smart woman, and it’s bad luck that keeps her from quickly finding someone to whom she can deliver the message (as well as the machinations of the man who murdered her father).<\/p>\n

Something else I appreciated is that the butler–a man insecure in his position–causes her a great deal of trouble, but he isn’t an evil man.<\/p>\n

Edgars had tried to belittle her, as if doing so would somehow lift him up. And no matter how much she needed the safety and anonymity of Aldridge House, she could not accept that.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I really liked this book, and even though it is the second book in the series, you can easily read it without having read the first book (since the characters from the first book barely appear in this book).
\nRating: 9\/10<\/strong><\/p>\n

Published by Gallery Books<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Banquet of Lies (2013) Michelle Diener Set in London in 1812 Giselle Barrington is the daughter of a folklorist with a fascination for cooking. \u201cWhat do you do with the recipes?\u201d The woman looked genuinely interested now. \u201cI\u2019m compiling a reference work of dishes from the cultures of Europe. But mainly I follow them.\u201d \u201cFollow […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13,30,24,33,8,26],"tags":[616,213,251,547,252],"class_list":["post-5752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-9-10","category-british","category-food","category-historical","category-mystery","category-romance","tag-cooking","tag-grief","tag-michelle-diener","tag-napoleonic-era","tag-regency-london"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/piQkW-1uM","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":12639,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/12639","url_meta":{"origin":5752,"position":0},"title":"Banquet of Lies","author":"Michelle","date":"March 17, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Banquet of Lies (2013) Michelle Diener (Regency London) Set in England in 1812. After reading Death Below Stairs I wanted to re-read a favorite of mine that also features a woman working as a cook in historical Britain. Every time I read this I love it a little bit more--there\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "9\/10"","block_context":{"text":"9\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/9-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"Banquet of Lies","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Banquet-of-Lies-659x1024.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":11624,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/11624","url_meta":{"origin":5752,"position":1},"title":"Banquet of Lies","author":"Michelle","date":"February 7, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Banquet of Lies (2013) Michelle Diener Set in London in 1812. This is my favorite book in this series--and I like the other two books quite well. Giselle Barrington has seen her father murdered for the secrets her carries. She manages to escape back to London, but does not know\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "9.5\/10"","block_context":{"text":"9.5\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/9-5-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Banquet-of-Lies-e1511038599836.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9205,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/9205","url_meta":{"origin":5752,"position":2},"title":"Banquet of Lies","author":"Michelle","date":"August 18, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Banquet of Lies (2013) Michelle Diener Set in England in 1812. Giselle Barrington has spent her life following her father around Europe, collecting folklore and working secretly for the Crown. She's developed her own strange passion: food, recipes, and cooking. \u201cWhat do you do with the recipes?\u201d The woman looked\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "9.5\/10"","block_context":{"text":"9.5\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/9-5-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Banquet-of-Lies.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":23609,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/23609","url_meta":{"origin":5752,"position":3},"title":"Banquet of Lies","author":"Michelle","date":"May 25, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Banquet of Lies (2013) Michelle Diener (Regency London) Set in London in 1812. Another favorite. \u201cWe\u2019ve been fattening Mavis up,\u201d Iris said, and something in the way she said it made Gigi go very still. If this was evidence of Mavis with more meat on her bones, she must have\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "9.5\/10"","block_context":{"text":"9.5\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/9-5-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"Banquet of Lies","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Banquet-of-Lies-e1511038599836.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":24417,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/24417","url_meta":{"origin":5752,"position":4},"title":"Banquet of Lies","author":"Michelle","date":"April 12, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Banquet of Lies (2013) Michelle Diener (Regency London #2) Set in London in 1812 \u201cHe reacted without thinking.\u201d \u201cHow can you send someone out to starve without thinking?\u201d Iris asked, her voice soft.\u201cWe\u2019ve been fattening Mavis up,\u201d Iris said, and something in the way she said it made Gigi go\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "10\/10"","block_context":{"text":"10\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/10-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"Banquet of Lies","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Banquet-of-Lies.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":19937,"url":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/19937","url_meta":{"origin":5752,"position":5},"title":"Banquet of Lies","author":"Michelle","date":"April 6, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"Banquet of Lies (2013) Michelle Diener (Regency London) I needed to reread this as well. For her, what people ate, and how they ate, was just as interesting as the stories they told. This one is also about food. Her voice was as bitter as burned coffee, and just as\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "9.5\/10"","block_context":{"text":"9.5\/10","link":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/archives\/category\/9-5-10"},"img":{"alt_text":"Banquet of Lies","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Banquet-of-Lies-e1511038599836.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5752\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/klishis.com\/reading\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}