Schemes & Scandals

Enjoying this novella is like eating dessert before the main course—the next full-length novel in this delightful series, A Rip Through Time. This nicely adds to the lore of Vancouver police detective Mallory Atkinson, who has been ripped into Victorian Scotland. This is her first Christmas spent in 1869 Scotland.

She finds herself stranded in a time period where Christmas is not celebrated and is considered a pagan holiday, virtually banned. The locals instead celebrate Hogmanay, the last day of the year. This New Year’s celebration involves similar traditions of gift-giving, parties, and festivities.

Mallory was originally thrown into these circumstances on May 20, 2019. The police detective ran into an alley where she heard the screams of a woman. Suddenly, a rope noose is thrust around her neck. Even though she struggles valiantly, she starts to pass out. Just before losing consciousness, she “sees” an optical illusion of “a young woman with honey-blond hair, in a cornflower-blue dress, as a shadowy figure has his hands wrapped around her throat.”

The world goes dark. She awakens confused and startled, and suddenly realizes she is inhabiting the body of an eighteen-year-old blond girl, Catriona Mitchell, in what is obviously Victorian Edinburgh, Scotland. Somehow, through a “rip in time,” she has traveled from May 20, 2019, to the same day in 1869.

Kelley Armstrong crafts a delightful tale combining elements of historical fiction, time travel, and a convoluted police procedural. Walking a dangerous tightrope, Armstrong expertly blends lengthy internal dialogue from Mallory/Catriona with the development of interesting, multi-dimensional Victorian characters. Catriona is a housemaid in the unique household of “undertaker” Dr. Duncan Gray and his half-sister, Isla Ballantyne. Dr. Gray is much more than a funeral director and is actually a trusted consultant of Detective McCreadie, examining murder victims. His studies and methods are the forerunners of modern forensic science. Isla is an exceptional variant of the women of the time—highly educated, but forced to work as a herbalist rather than a chemist, due directly to her gender. Dr. Gray, despite being highly educated, is dismissed as irrelevant and somewhat of a charlatan because he is Black. Through perseverance and guile, Mallory eventually proves her worth, gains Dr. Gray’s trust, and becomes his true assistant in his investigative endeavors.

In the spirit of the upcoming Hogmanay, Gray presents Isla and Mallory with tickets for a special reading at the music hall by the popular writer, Charles Dickens. His performance delights Mallory, as it’s not a mere author reading but an actual performance, with Dickens acting out the different characters. Mallory arrives at the reading with a copy of her favorite Dickens book, hoping to obtain his signature. However, this is not common in Victorian times. Dr. Gray is approached by an “old flame,” the widower Lady Patricia Inglis, a family friend of Charles Dickens. Lady Inglis offers to introduce them to Dickens for a possible signature. At the same time, she confides in them and requests their aid. She is being blackmailed. She has been sending intimate letters to a long-time lover, a dear friend of her husband’s, with whom her friendship blossomed into intimacy after her husband’s passing.

Her lover has informed her that the letters, stored in a locked box, have disappeared. This was not discovered until he received a threatening letter stating the letters would be sold to a publisher of ill repute unless a sizable ransom was paid. When Mallory first arrived in Catriona’s beautiful and fetching body, she realized her murky past as a con artist and a thief, possibly using her “feminine wiles” for illicit purposes. Mallory discovered that Catriona had in her possession a similar letter from Lady Inglis to Dr. Gray. She burned the letter after disclosing its existence to Gray. Mallory eventually agrees to help Lady Inglis uncover the blackmailer and hopefully recover the letters. Dr. Gray quickly agrees to help in the investigation, despite his past relationship with Lady Inglis. The dynamics between the main characters continue to evolve based on past and present motivations. There has been a slow-burn romance between Mallory and Dr. Gray, somewhat threatened by the current circumstances.

Kelley Armstrong proves to be a marvelous storyteller as she weaves multiple twists into the plot, escalating suspense and intrigue into a thrilling denouement that is satisfying while leaving many unresolved questions, knowing there is more to come. Armstrong explores themes of women’s equality, racism, immigration, and even homosexuality. It has been a pleasure to see the character of Mallory unfold, with her intelligence and determination, while being adaptable and resilient. While this can be enjoyed as a standalone, I would encourage reading the previous entries in the A Rip in Time series to fully enjoy the experience of Armstrong’s conjured world of Victorian Edinburgh.

Thanks to NetGalley and Subterranean Press for providing an Uncorrected Proof in exchange for an honest review. I truly cannot wait for the fourth installment to be released.