An Unmarked Grave (Bess Crawford Series #4)

by Charles Todd

Overview

“A wonderful new mystery series that will let us see the horrors of World War I through the eyes of Bess Crawford, battlefield nurse.”
—Margaret Maron

“Readers who can’t get enough of Jacqueline Winspear’s novels, or Hester Latterly, who saw action in the Crimean War in a series of novels by Anne Perry, are bound to be caught up in the adventures of Bess Crawford.”
—New York Times Book Review

The critically acclaimed, New York Times bestselling author of the Ian Rutledge mystery series, Charles Todd once again spotlights World War I nurse Bess Crawford in An Unmarked Grave. Gripping, powerful, and evocative, this superb mystery masterwork unfolds during the deadly Spanish Influenza pandemic of 1918, as Bess discovers the body of a murdered British officer among the many dead and sets out to unmask a craven killer.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062015723
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	06/05/2012
Series:	Bess Crawford Series , #4
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	6.34(w) x 9.08(h) x 0.95(d)

About the Author

Charles Todd is the New York Times bestselling author of the Inspector Ian Rutledge mysteries, the Bess Crawford mysteries, and one stand-alone novel. A mother-and-son writing team, they live in Delaware and North Carolina, respectively.

Editorial Reviews

Set in the spring of 1918, bestseller Todd’s outstanding fourth Bess Crawford mystery (after 2011’s A Bitter Truth) finds the British nurse and her co-workers in France contending with the Spanish influenza epidemic as well as battlefield carnage. When the number of flu victims kept in a shed before burial is one more than the official count, Bess is shocked to discover the corpse of Maj. Vincent Carson, who once served in her father’s old regiment, in the shed. That the major’s neck is broken suggests that his body was dumped amid the flu victims to conceal his murder. Before Bess can act on her suspicions, she catches the dread disease herself, leaving the trail to the truth even fainter on her recovery. Caroline and Charles Todd, the mother-son team who write as Charles Todd, remain unmatched in their ability to convey the horrors of trench warfare and the effect on its participants. Agent: Jane Chelius, Jane Chelius Literary Agency. (June)

Publishers Weekly

Plucky battlefield nurse Bess Crawford (A Bitter Truth, 2011, etc.) fights World War I diseases, deserters and more. When Pvt. Wilson, heading up the burial detail, notices that one of the corpses has no wounds except for a broken neck, he summons nurse Bess Crawford to decide what to do. Bess recognizes the victim as Maj. Vincent Carson, a former member of her father's old regiment. But before she can get a message to her dad, the Col. Sahib, she's stricken with influenza, falls into a coma, and is shipped home from Ypres to Dorset. In recovery, she volunteers at Somerset's Longleigh House clinic, where a wounded Yank, Capt. Thomas Barclay, becomes semismitten and helps her investigate who might have wanted Carson dead. Simon Brandon, her father's former batman now handling classified assignments for the government, also tries to help, but is seriously wounded before making much headway. Bess returns to France, as does the Yank. Soon enough she must face death twice, confront a deserter with good intentions, shoot a purported British officer in the head, sort through the whereabouts and motives of seven brothers, keep tabs on the Kaiser and the Prince of Wales, and worry about poor Simon's state of health. Her father will have to step in to see to her safety, but peripatetic Bess, who crosses the channel innumerable times, sets matters right. How many wartime casualties and heroics from Bess does it take to exhaust a reader? Unfortunately, exactly this many, despite the author's fierce antiwar sentiments. Readers weary of Bess can take refuge in Todd's Ian Rutledge series (The Confession, 2012, etc.).

Kirkus Reviews