Kirkus Reviews QR Code
ON THE HORNS OF DEATH by Eleanor Kuhns

ON THE HORNS OF DEATH

by Eleanor Kuhns

Pub Date: April 2nd, 2024
ISBN: 9781448310883
Publisher: Severn House

A bull dancer’s curious nature may prove the death of her.

In ancient Crete, bull dancing is for the brave and agile. Martis, the rebel of her family, still finds it thrilling. Arriving at the caves under Knossos one day, Martis immediately realizes that something is very wrong: The bull chosen for the upcoming sacrificial ceremony is clearly upset. Looking through a crack in his pen, Martis sees a dead body that’s soon identified as Duzi, a captured pirate who’d volunteered to join the bull dancers rather than be executed. Martis tells Tinos, consort to the High Priestess and a former bull dancer himself, that she’s sure Duzi was murdered—he was terrified of bulls, she says, and would never have entered the pen on his own. Not to mention the stab wounds on his chest. Although Martis has solved murders in the past, Tinos, whom she adores, rebuffs her, which makes her only more determined to investigate. Soon Martis must decide if she will continue bull dancing now that it’s nearly time for the agoge, her initiation into adulthood, after which she’ll be pressured to marry by her mother, a weaver who’s already lost two daughters to violence. Martis hates to think that the killer is a fellow dancer, but Duzi knew hardly anyone else. Ruling out the youngsters, she begins to pry into the lives of the adult dancers. A visit to Duzi’s room turns up a very expensive piece of jewelry that two male members of the dance team claim as their own. When another dancer is murdered, Martis is not deterred, even by the possibility that she’ll be next.

A convoluted mystery seamlessly woven into a wealth of historical detail.