Para lady Julia Grey y Nicholas Brisbane, la luna de miel había terminado… pero la aventura acababa de comenzar. Ante los ruegos de la excéntrica familia de Julia, los dos se marcharon a la India para ayudar a una vieja amiga, Jane Cavendish. Jane estaba preocupada por el inminente nacimiento de su hijo, y angustiada por descubrir la verdad sobre la muerte de su marido. ¿Había sido asesinado por sus propiedades? En aquel lugar exótico y remoto, se ocultaban actos oscuros y surgían pensamientos maliciosos. Los Brisbane descubrieron secretos y escándalos, aventuras ilícitas y herencias tortuosas, pero la investigación era peligrosa y el descubrimiento, mortífero. Si no tenían cuidado, Julia y Nicholas no vivirían para celebrar su primer aniversario.

My least favorite of the series so far. Too long, and most of the story consists of Julia and Brisbane working behind each other's back, keeping secrets and competing to solve the crime - if there is a crime - and this whole competitive couple trope annoys me.

Julia's family accost her and Brisbane at the end of their honeymoon and convince them to go to India to help her sister Portia's ex, Jane, recover after her husband's death and prepare her for impending motherhood. But Jane suspects her husband was murdered and that his family may not wish her and the new child good health. Entailment laws: possibly the single greatest boon to historical mystery writers since adultery.

Once again, characters from previous novels make an appearance; it seems no matter where Julia goes, her world remains small. New characters are introduced and more of Brisbane's less scandalous secrets are revealed. None of this was necessary to the central plot of this book, but readers may enjoy the karmic justice that is doled out. As for the introduction of Black Jack, I don't know why the author bothered or what she wanted me to take away from it.

Given all this, I still enjoyed the story and I still lost myself in the characters and the setting. The mystery was twisty and the conclusion itself, somewhat twisted. It's not a neat and tidy ending that will leave all readers content, but it will probably leave more than a few surprised; it sure surprised me. At the end, I was as relieved to be leaving India behind as the characters, and I'm looking forward to being back in London with them for the final full-length book/mystery. ( )

Awesome as always :) ( )

Synopsis: Jane contacts Portia telling her that she's near to having a baby and she feels that her life is in danger. Off go Portia and Plum to India, collecting Brisbane and Julia from their honeymoon and dropping them into a murder mystery - or is it? Brisbane takes up tiger hunting - but only the one that is killing villagers; he also adopts disguises to collect information about people in the region. Julia meets a family that includes a lady photographer, her preacher husband, her sulking teen aged daughter, and her very bright son. She also meets the 'White Rajah' who seems to want to help her investigation.
Review: This is a disturbing book, partially because of the true villain of the piece and the manner in which the preacher's family interact with each other. Although Julia is still in the role of chattel, she seems to be moving toward emancipation. ( )

This was not as good as the previous Lady Julia Grey books. The story took way too long to develop and she was quite redundant in getting there so you could almost skip pages and not miss anything. I'll give the next one a chance but if that one is not well written either than I'll assume both author and publisher are spending more time marketing this as bad romance instead of mystery writing. ( )