Showing Murder Behind the Scenes: A Victorian Mystery by Isabella Macready

MURDER BEHIND THE SCENES is a detective novel set in Victorian England. In 1857 a young actress called Emily Broughton leaves London to join a provincial theatre company in the seaside town of Handford. She finds a company full of petty rivalries and eccentric actors, but it is also a time of great excitement as American star Ira Douglas is about to make a guest appearance at the theatre.

Emily is soon befriended by the theatre’s wealthy patron Euphemia Pelham, but it emerges Miss Pelham has an ulterior motive and is not as respectable as she seems. After a new acquaintance is poisoned, Emily is forced to investigate the shocking murder of her friend when she herself receives anonymous letters, seemingly from the murderer, threatening to reveal compromising secrets from Emily’s own past.

Murder Behind the Scenes is a full length mystery novel and is 100,102 words (the print edition is 328 pages). Isabella Macready is a pen name. She has previously published one novel and two biographies of historical figures.