The White Rose Murders

A bizarre series of murders inside the court of Henry VIII is the center of this dramatic and colorful mystery in the tradition of Ellis Peters.In 1517 the English armies have defeated and killed James IV of Scotland at Flodden, and James's widow queen. Margaret, sister to Henry VIII, has fled to England, leaving her children behind and her crown under a Council of Regency. Sir Roger Shallot, a bon vivant with the sharpest wits and fastest legs in Christendom, and his friend Benjamin Daunbey, nephew to Cardinal Wolsey, are ordered to restore her to her throne. They encounter a murder conspiracy and bloody intrigue on every side.Dr. Selkirk, a half-mad physician imprisoned in the Tower, has information they need, but he is found poisoned in a locked chamber, guarded by soldiers, the only clue a poem of riddles. Other gruesome murders soon follow: at a haunted manor house in England; in the dark recesses of the Tower. The assassin is unknown, but always leaves a white rose - the mark of Les Blancs Sangliers, the secret society that plots the overthrow of the Tudor Monarchy.