Inspector Saul Jackson has to call on the Waldegrave family to inform its head that there is a notorious burglar loose, and his old safe needs replacing. What he does not know is that over the next few weeks all hell is literally going to break loose at Langley Court.

Much as I enjoy this author’s tales of King James Rents and DI Box, it is this series I have always enjoyed the most. Other people write of foggy Victorian London and espionage, but nobody else does gothic quite like Mr. Russell. This book is full to bursting with his trademark gothic atmosphere, from a ghastly scene amid a burning folly to boxes of secret papers, poisonings in eerie old houses to an intangible miasma of doom surrounding an ancient family. To combat all this darkness are the sensible Saul Jackson and his loveable sidekick Herbert Bottomley. There is a good period atmosphere and I particularly like the way the series is set in rural Warwickshire, which is not a setting often encountered in novels. Perhaps it is not too hard to guess whodunit, but as ever this is not the main reason for reading the novel. If you haven’t yet read any of these books you are in for a treat, starting with The Dried Up Man (Amazon US || UK). I hope I can wait a whole year for the next one...