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ALReview-0040

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'The Cheapside Corpse' by Susanna Gregory

This is tenth in the Thomas Challoner series. It is a crime novel set in London in 1665, at the time of the plague and during the period when Charles 11's England finds itself at war with the Dutch. This is especially worrying for bankers and financiers because they know the king wants them to fund the war.

We meet an array of nefarious, gullible, sly and extremely violent and corrupt characters conducting their lives in a well-described and mostly seedy part of London.

Most of us found it an interesting book, well-written and full of excellent descriptions of London. The author researched the subject extremely well. In fact, a comment was that there was too much detail, and so the book was on times rather laborious. The characters, of whom there were many, were considered overall to be not very well formed, almost ghostly, so there was no feeling of really knowing them.

There were several themes and plots running through the book all leading towards a disastrous finale. There may have been some mixed feelings about the book but overall we thought it a good read.