Unnatural Fire ***signed*** [signed] [first edition]

Restoration London, 1699-Anastasia Ashby de la Zouche, Baroness Penge, Countess of Clapham, and former mistress to King Charles 11, as fallen on hard times. jailed in the notorsious debtors' prison, the Fleet, the Countess finds her only way out is to embark on a career selling sensational and explicit stories to one of London's leading tabloids.Joining forces with her loyal ex-maidservant Alpiew, the formerly pampered and proper Countess sets out to make a living by working for he scandal sheets --a line of work that inevitably leads her through some of the seamier highways and byways of the city. And she and Alpiew even find a welcome additional source of income when they are approached by a stranger who asks them to follow her husband and gather evidence to prove he's committing adultery. But the uncomfortable job of trailing after the handsome merchant in the depths of winter-whether to the half-constructed St Paul's Cathedral or through the notorious dives south of the Strand ends abruptly in Covent Garden churchyard with a brutal murder.Implicated in the crime, the Countess and Alpiew find themselves drawn into a complex labyrinth of deceit and violence-the key to which might lie in the mysterious world of alchemy. And the more they investigate, the more complex the picture becomes, involving everyone from the most decrepit back-alley criminals to some of the most influential people in all the land.Unnatural Fire is a wonderfully funny, lively, and audacious novel with a cast of characters that leap off the page. But underlying the vivacity and humor is a riveting mystery that perfectly captures the dark and bawdy underbelly of life in London at the turn of the eighteenth century.