The Rival Queens. A Novel of Artifice, Gunpowder and Murder in Eighteenth-Century London

London 1699. Countess Ashby de la Zouche and her maid, the faithful Alpiew, are dashing around, plying their trade as scandal-mongers. Happily, scandals are falling in their laps like ripe plums. But scandal takes on some gravitas when the Countess and Alpiew are hired to solve the murder of a popular leading lady. And things get yet more serious when they stumble into a mess of corruption with connections to the very furthest reaches of society.