The insane asylum on Blackwell’s Island is a human rat trap. It is easy to get in, but once there it is impossible to get out. —Nellie Bly

Elizabeth Cochrane has a secret. She isn’t the madwoman with amnesia the doctors and inmates at Blackwell’s Asylum think she is. In truth, she’s working undercover for the New York World. When the managing editor refuses to hire her because she’s a woman, Elizabeth strikes a deal: in exchange for a job, she’ll impersonate a lunatic to expose a local asylum’s abuses. When she arrives at the asylum, Elizabeth realizes she must make a decision—is she there merely to bear witness, or to intervene on behalf of the abused inmates? Can she interfere without blowing her cover? As the superintendent of the asylum grows increasingly suspicious, Elizabeth knows her scheme—and her dream of becoming a journalist in New York—is in jeopardy. A Feigned Madness is a meticulously researched, fictionalized account of the woman who would come to be known as daredevil reporter Nellie Bly. At a time of cutthroat journalism, when newspapers battled for readers at any cost, Bly emerged as one of the first to break through the gender barrier—a woman who would, through her daring exploits, forge a trail for women fighting for their place in the world.

Investigative reporter ‘Justice’ Harper stumbles into a fresh murder scene of a hated businessman. Justice’s mere presence at the scene soon adds him to the list of suspects, along with three other local citizens who each have a unique motive.

Blaze Barbeau, a wealthy woman, married to a local business man and rumoured to be having an affair with the victim. Lucinda Boyd, a generous widow, heavily involved in charity events, whose business was recently conned out of her control by the victim obtaining majority shares by dubious means. And Belladonna Dede, a Voodoo Queen whose wares were found at the crime scene.

Justice is determined to find out the truth regarding the demise of this wealthy man which leads him into some uncertain situations. He must be getting close when the threats start arriving. He will not stop. He’s close. Who committed this crime? The Sinner? The Saint? Or the Serpent?

Fast paced with plot twists bursting from every page, Sinner, Saint or Serpent will keep you on the edge of your seat until the shocking end.

Lisbon,1940:
With Europe in turmoil and France falling, British agent Taylor Hartridge obtains the Nazi invasion plans for Britain. He suspects a double agent in the Lisbon Embassy and insists on taking the plans to London, but is murdered before his departure, the plans stolen.
London analyst Simon Cole arrives in Lisbon, woefully unprepared but willing and determined, pitted against a German spy called the Chameleon, a master of disguise. Racing to recover the plans before the invasion is launched, Cole hunts for Hartridge’s killer while exposing the double agent in Lisbon—even if it’s the woman he loves.

Berlin, 1943.

British agent Michael York is sent to Berlin to solve the mystery of his predecessor’s death.

A member of the Berlin String Quartet, four talented musicians, had offered the British Intelligence officer valuable information. But another member had betrayed him, and turned him in to the Gestapo.

Each of the musicians has access to vital information and can easily be the one who betrayed York’s predecessor.

York finds the quartet difficult to assess. Amanda Hamilton is lead violinist and a former Brit. Her husband is a German citizen, Manfred Richter, a high ranking Nazi.

She could be the Gestapo informant, loyal to her husband even with his indiscretions. An amateur photographer, she has chronicled ten years of life in Germany, and is a favorite of Hitler.

Erika Jaeger, second violinist, works in the logistics department of the War Ministry. Viola player Gerhard works as a draftsmen for the Armaments Department, with access to secret weapons. The last of the quartet, Albert Kaiser, has access to valuable information through highly-placed relatives.

With the aid of a British master spy, Max, York works painstakingly to solve the riddle and gather information for the Allies. He must tiptoe through the streets of Berlin, always cautious, always aware, knowing that a child could betray him as easily as a grandmother.

He approaches each member of the quartet, watching and waiting, probing their weaknesses and avoiding their strengths. As the months pass, he observes and assesses, learns their secrets, and evaluates their loyalties.

Michael York must decide who is on his side, who is dangerous, and who is in danger. As the Gestapo slowly begins to close in on York, his friendship with Amanda blooms to romance and they plan their escape from Germany. Nothing can prepare him for the revelations that follow.

Psychiatrist Joseph Barnett is treating wealthy socialite Penelope Jones for schizophrenia at a sanitarium in Como. She is convinced someone is trying to kill her.

Penelope is married to war veteran Alexander Cavendish, hero of the Battle of the Somme. Barnett knows – and hates – Cavendish from the trenches where both were officers during the battle: one was trying to save lives, the other take them.

Both men had been wounded and treated at a hospital in Amiens where Bartlett met and later married Rose who worked there as a nurse. But why does Rose also harbour an intense animosity towards Cavendish?

John Anthony Miller’s fifth crime novel Honour the Dead is a Rubik’s Cube of a murder case. Everyone is a suspect, there are motives to spare – readers will go dizzy trying to solve it...

Motivated by a life-long love of travel and history, John Anthony Miller's books are normally set in exotic locations during eras of global conflict. Characters must cope and combat, overcoming their own weaknesses as well as the catastrophes spawned by tumultuous times. He's the author of To Parts Unknown, When Darkness Comes, In Satan's Shadow, and All the King's Soldiers. He lives in southern New Jersey with his family.

London, January 1942. London Times war correspondent, George Adams, is a tortured soul, devastated by his wife's death and rejected by all branches of the military. Destroyed by events he couldn't control, he can't face the future and won't forget the past. His editor sends him to Singapore, a city threatened by the Japanese, hoping the exotic location and impending crisis will erase his haunting memories. Within minutes of his arrival, George is caught in a near-fatal air raid that triggers a chain of conflict and catastrophes. Injured and sheltered underground, he meets Thomas Montclair, a crafty French spy, and Lady Jane Carrington Smythe, an English aristocrat, who are destined to share his adventures. When a Japanese general is murdered, Lady Jane becomes the prime suspect. The trio flees the enemy and their own troubled pasts, confronting personal demons as well as the Japanese. They chase their dreams and elude their nightmares, evading a manhunt that spans the islands of the southwest Pacific, their lives wrapped in a swirling kaleidoscope of death, doubt, and desire.

East Berlin, 1961. Kirstin Beck is determined to escape to the West. She watches from her townhouse window as the border with West Berlin is closed, and a barbed wire fence strung through the cemetery behind her house. With a grandmother in West Berlin that needs her, Kirstin knows she has to go.

Tony Marino is an American writer living in West Berlin. As he watches the nearby construction progress, he sees a beautiful woman looking from her townhouse window. Kirstin holds up a sign for Tony to see.

HELP ME.

The two hatch a plan for Kirstin to get over the border, but the mission is not easy. With the Stasi closing in on them, Kirstin and Tony enter a kaleidoscope of deceit and danger, determined to attain freedom at any cost. But in a country torn between communism and capitalism, can Kirstin escape the world she can't endure?

Paris: 1942 Three lives intertwined in Nazi-occupied Paris: Paul, a brooding banker whose family was killed by the Gestapo, Rachel, a teenage Jew who leads her family's escape from the Germans, Claire, a demure bookstore owner who finds courage and conviction - all confronted by an infamous Nazi collaborator. In the sprawling network of catacombs underneath the Left Bank of Paris, they hide thousands of Jewish refugees, giving them new identities and leading them to safety. Together they move forward, outsmarting a ruthless enemy, overcoming obstacles, defying danger, moving farther and faster, almost invincible-until an innocent bystander notices something amiss and their entire world collapses around them.

In 1856, Clarinda Ridge has returned to her Cherokee home. Through a night’s torrential storm, she reads her parent’s love story, authored by her own hand.

Her father, Cherokee, John Ridge, attends the Foreign Mission School, a Connecticut academy for intelligent Indians in 1818. Because of recurring illness, he meets the steward’s daughter, Sarah, who nurses him. Despite her pious parents and the protests of Cornwall’s residents, the two fall in love and marry in 1824.

Bringing his bride home to the Appalachians, John, now a lawyer and member of the Cherokee Legislative Council, intercedes against the U.S. government’s Indian Agents to prevent the removal of neighboring Creek Nation in an attempt to build sovereignty for his own people.

Sarah, leaves the hamlet of Cornwall, Connecticut to make a home in a culture foreign to her. She befriends Honey, half-Cherokee and half-slave, belonging to the Ridge family. Pregnant with their first child, Sarah faces captivity from white squatters, trades her freedom for Honey’s life, and inadvertently, forces John to abandon his adopted white culture and return to his Cherokee heritage to find her and bring her home.

Unhappily married to Stephen de Marais, the Welsh princess, Nest, becomes increasingly embroiled in her countrymen’s resistance to the Norman occupation of her family’s lands. She plans to visit King Henry in the hope of securing a life away from her unwanted husband, but grieving for the loss of his son, the King is obsessed with relics and prophecies.



Meanwhile, Haith tries to avoid the reality that Nest is married to another man by distracting himself with the mystery of the shipwreck in which the King’s heir drowned. As Haith pieces together fragments of the tragedy, he discovers a chest full of secrets, but will the revelations bring a culprit to light and aid the grieving King?



Will the two lovers be united as Nest fights for independence and Haith struggles to protect King Henry?

When Warr delved into Welsh history and discovered Nest, she must have known she’d struck story gold. Warr creates a believable world by imagining lives less about politics and more about love, and this emotional involvement kept me reading.- Helen Johnson, Historical Novel Society

Rome 1638

Old sins have long shadows ~ Italian Proverb

Giulia Tofana never wanted to be a nun, but she is determined to atone for her past misdeeds by making her new monastery a success.

When an unexpected disaster closes the convent, Giulia is forced to turn to her old friend Fabio Pasello for help. Giulia still has intense feelings for Fabio and Fabio’s passion for her has never diminished.

But they are not the same people they were before. Giulia has taken her vows, and Fabio is apprenticed to Gianlorenzo Bernini the famous sculptor, and has become one of Bernini’s rakish libertines. They could not be further apart.

To add to their problems, Giulia cannot escape her reputation as a poisoner, and is soon embroiled in a plot against Fabio’s patron, Pope Urban VIII. Faced with the idea of murder, will Giulia renounce her vows or embrace them?

Inspired by true stories, this is a novel of nuns and courtesans, artists and priests, in the shadow and splendour of the Eternal City.

'Swift is a consummate historical novelist, basing her books on immaculate research and then filling the gaps between real events and real people with eloquent storytelling, atmospheric scene setting and imaginative plot lines.' - The Visitor

Naples 1633

Aqua Tofana – One drop to heal. Three drops to kill.

Giulia Tofana longs for more responsibility in her mother’s apothecary business, but Mamma has always been secretive and refuses to tell her the hidden keys to her success. But the day Mamma is arrested for the poisoning of the powerful Duke de Verdi, Giulia is shocked to uncover the darker side of her trade.

Giulia must run for her life, and escapes to Naples, under the shadow of Mount Vesuvius, to the home of her Aunt Isabetta, a famous courtesan. But when Giulia hears that her mother has been executed, and the cruel manner of her death, she swears she will wreak revenge on the Duke de Verdi.

The trouble is, Naples is in the grip of Domenico, the Duke’s brother, who controls the city with the ‘Camorra’, the mafia. Worse, her Aunt Isabetta, under his thrall, insists that she should be consort to him.

Based on the legendary life of Giulia Tofana, this is a story of hidden family secrets, and how courage and love can overcome vengeance.

'Her characters are so real they linger in the mind long after the book is back on the shelf' Historical Novel Society