The Great Revolt

Set in 1381, Doherty’s enthralling 16th Brother Athelstan mystery finds the Dominican Order at Blackfriars in an uproar over the stabbing death of Brother Alberic, whose body has been found in a locked guest room. Fortunately, Brother Athelstan, erudite fellow friar and parish priest of St. Erconwald’s in Southwark, is on hand to investigate the baffling murder and the five that follow. Outside the friary walls, death takes a far greater toll, as the Wat Tyler–led peasant revolt against Richard II, simmering in 2015’s The Herald of Hell, boils over. Meanwhile, a subplot involving the scandalous fate of a different king, Edward II, deposed 52 years earlier, complicates the story line. Along the way to a denouement both audacious and satisfying, connoisseurs of Brother Athelstan’s world will enjoy the cerebral discussions taking place in monastic chambers suffused with incense and candle smoke, juxtaposed with the chaotic filthy roar of 14th-century London. Agent: David Headley, David Headley Literary Agency (U.K.). (July)