THE HANGING TREE

In 1382 London, multiple murders surrounding a theft from the king’s treasury provide a dangerous puzzle for a coroner and a monk to solve.

Brother Athelstan, parish priest of St. Erconwald, and Sir John Cranston, Lord High Coroner of London, have partnered to solve many a murky mystery, but few have been as troublesome as the theft of the money meant to pay a royal debt to Italian bankers and the murders surrounding it. Exchequer of Coin Henry Beaumont, who’s tasked with removing funds from the impregnable Flambard’s Tower, arrives there to find all his underlings dead and the treasure gone. When Master Thibault, Keeper of the King’s Secrets, calls upon the sleuthing pair to discover how the murders were committed and the coin stolen, they proceed to examine the tower and the bodies. They also look into the murders of the hangmen of London in search of possible connections. Athelstan finds more and more people dead, even one in his own parish church. The Italian bankers, who are naturally suspect, blame the Carbonari, a society of thieves, but after examining every avenue, Athelstan is sure this must have been an inside job. The little monk travels the squalid, dangerous streets looking for clues and finds the answer even more horrifying than he could imagine.

Hair-raising descriptions of life in the Middle Ages enhance a challenging puzzle.