First published 2024
Stoker prepares to install clockwork into what appears to be a wax Sleeping Beauty for Lord Rosemorran's collection. His blade reveals something horrific: the figure contains the preserved body of a real woman. Veronica and Stoker must identify the victim and her killer. Their investigation leads them through London's scientific underground, where researchers use electricity to animate the dead. They visit traveling shows where human curiosities perform for crowds. The killer stalks them as they work, a man who murdered for love and wants his victim's body back. He plans to add more figures to his macabre collection. Veronica and Stoker race to stop him before he claims another life or makes them his next preserved specimens.
Genres: fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, mystery, crime, thriller, detective, 19th-century
Vibes: dark, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: amateur-sleuth, enemies-to-lovers, race-against-time
Setting: London
Period: 19th-century
336 pages · Hardcover · Berkley
Content warnings: body-horror, gore, graphic-violence