In this briskly-paced mystery, Jack Blackjack lends his wry voice to observe events that spiral quickly out of his control. On the run from his lover's husband, Blackjack finds refuge in Woodstock Palace...or so he thinks. Brought on by his master, Blount, as an assassin, Blackjack finds the deed has been accomplished before he could commit the murder, as the title suggests. We accompany Blackjack on his journey to discover who murdered Lady Throcklehampton, a spy inserted into the household of Lady Elizabeth (the future Elizabeth I). Jecks provides great sensory texture to this story - his descriptions of sights, sounds, and sometimes unsavory scents capture the early modern setting quite well. His dialogue is on the whole quick and crackling (and while his diction at times does slip into some dissonant, almost anachronistic asides, these are few and far between). I also thought he laid bare the realities of life's instability in sixteenth-century England for men and women of all social ranks - he tackles issues of shaky inheritance, illiteracy, violence, healthcare, and even issues of gender inequality. In terms of characterization, it's easy to be on Blackjack's team: he's an earnest, droll, and ultimately lucky character (despite the bumps and bruises and ill luck he encounters along the way). And the Lady Elizabeth's displays of fortitude and wit are equally winsome. This is a great, quick read for those interested in a speculative look at a particularly dark chapter in Queen Elizabeth's life (her imprisonment at Woodstock), and fun for fans of historical mysteries.

Michael Jecks gives readers the second Jack Blackjack Tudor mystery, a Murder Too Soon, in which Lady Margery, the lady in waiting to and spy on Princess Elizabeth is murdered.; Jack had been sent to the castle where Elizabeth was held captive with orders to kill Lady Margery. who got there first? Factions are in conflict. Whodunit? Will Jack find out before Elizabeth is arrested for conspiring against her sister Queen Mary ? Jack Blackjack is an untrustworthy, but interesting rascal. Look forward to more stories about him.

There's trouble and then there's Jack!

Ah Jack, Jack! Always a hair's breadth from serious trouble and yet like a cat with nine lives you land on your feet--sort of.
Jack Blackjack, the consummate con artist has his master John Blount fooled into thinking he's an assassin. So when Blount actually sends him off to kill Lady Margery Throcklehampton, one of Lady Elizabeth's ladies-in-waiting, Jack's not happy. (Elizabeth is under what amounts to house arrest by her sister, Queen Mary). Although on the bright side this takes him out of London and away from Thomas Falkes, whom he owes money to and who is not happy. As Jack muses, Falkes "wanted to personally skin [him] alive–and he was not a slave to metaphor."
But when Jack finds himself caught in the middle of a struggle for the Tudor throne, Woodstock was no place Jack wanted to be. When he trips over the dead body of the lady he's sent to murder, things take a grim and complicated turn. Jack becomes a suspect for a murder he didn't commit, that his master now thinks he actually did, fulfilling his assassin's role, thereby keeping himself on Blount's payroll, and yet this was a "murder to soon." (Very clever title by the way). Jack continues to play a role in this latest charade, earning himself the acknowledgment of the Lady Elizabeth, but eventually at what cost?
Jack is a character of many facets, fool comes to mind most often but then there's, cut purse, gambler, ladies man, intuitive thinker and a survivalist. One day his luck might just run out!
An engaging read with a rapscallion, likeable character as the centrepiece. I love the understated self-deprecating humour of Jack. He's definitely a charmer!
Michael Jecks' insights into the Tudor period with the various swirling forces parrying for leadership and change, or just protecting the status quo is fascinating.

A NetGalley ARC
(September 2017)

It's 1554 and Jack Blackjack (a former thief), is now employed as an unlikely assassin by John Blount who thankfully for Jack sends him to Woodstock, the place of imprisonment of the Lady Elizabeth to kill a spy in her household.
Soon after he arrives the murder occursand as he is First Finder he must prove his innocence by determing who is the guilty party.
As I didn't take to the character of Jack and it seemed that whatever could go wrong did, this did tend to spoil my enjoyment of the tale.

A Murder Too Soon: A Tudor Mystery is the second book of the Jack Blackjack mysteries, set in 1554 London. Jack is a former “cutpurse”, who always lands into trouble. In this book, Jack must become an assassin for his employer John Blout. His intended target is one of Princess Elizabeth’s attendants who is believed to be a spy for the princess’s half-sister, Queen Mary. But on arriving in Woodstock where the princess is being held under guard in the likelihood that she may want to kill the queen and usurp the crown, Lady Margery is murdered by someone else. Jack, however, is the “first finder” and blamed. In order to clear his name, Jack stumbles his way through the palace and a host of characters, who are hiding their own secrets and may have their own reasons for wanting Lady Margery dead.

A Murder Too Soon was pure entertainment. Jack is a lovable misfit who always finds himself in trouble but manages to sweet-talk or connive himself out. The other characters whether significant or not, along with the various setting, are intricately illustrated, bringing them to vivid and humorous life. The climate of the time is captured concisely with those who support Queen Mary and her desire to restore Catholicism to England again and those like Princess Elizabeth who prefer the Church of England to continue.

The novel was a fun and enjoyable romp, and I look forward to seeing what mishap next awaits the unlikely hero of Jack Blackjack.
Reviewed for Historical Novels Society

Our recalcitrant near-do-well Jack Blackjack, is ordered by his patron to murder a Lady-in-Waiting to the Lady Elizabeth. A survivor of the rebellion against Queen Mary, Jack is only too happy to leave the confines, and dangers (in the guise of a very angry cuckolded husband) of London for the bucolic English countryside. Now Jack may be an assassin for hire, but he is also not a killer of women. How he is going to pull off his assignment is something of frustration to him.

Read the entire review at https://journalingonpaper.com/2017/08/07/book-review-a-murder-too-soon-a-tudor-mystery-by-michael-jecks/

Thank you to NetGalley and Severn Publishing for allowing me to review a digital copy of this novel.

This is the second book in the Jack Blackjack series and we now find Jack in a much better place - at least from a financial standpoint because he now has a permanent job, a house to live in and money to spend on his favorite pastimes, drinking and entertaining the ladies. All of this without having to cut any purse strings. The trouble is that Jack has been put on retainer of sorts to be an assassin. Jack knows he is definitely not an assassin but he figures he will cross that bridge when he gets the order to kill somebody. Unfortunately that opportunity is given to him soon after the Rebellion has quieted down, Queen Mary is on the throne and all should be well. Naturally all is not well. Jack is instructed to leave his beloved London and go to the palace at Woodstock, two or three days journey on the other side of Oxford. The Lady Elizabeth is being confined there. Jack is appalled; not only must he leave London , but he has to travel to some horrible, crumbling palace and kill a woman. Luckily it isn't Lady Elizabeth, but it is someone very close to her. What to do, what to do? How can Jack come out smelling like a rose this time?

Once again Michael Jecks has presented the stumble-bumble Jack Blackjack as a quite good example of the anti-hero. Jack is unfortunate enough to fall over corpses, be attacked by all sorts of people all the time while being generally beaten about the head and pricked with a knife more times than I cared to keep count of. Jack isn't at Woodstock alone but since he doesn't really trust the men he works for he might as well be. My criticism is that there were too many physical attacks and injuries to Jack's poor body with absolutely no time to recover from one injury before being beaten up again. This whole book takes place over four days time and that is how the book is divided, there are no chapter breaks, just days. I also thought the book went on for a little too long and it would have been an even better read for me if there hadn't been so many twists and turns to wind the story down. So now I've read two Jack Blackjack stories. Did I enjoy this one enough to look forward to a third? That's a good question and even I don't know the answer yet.

Jack is one of my favorite characters. No longer a common street thief, he is living well due to the fortune of his benefactor. Only now his benefactor is demanding payment in the form of killing a Lady who is believed to be a spy planted in Princess Elizabeth's court.

Jack balks at this assignment and tries his best to get out of it, but he must pay the piper.

When he arrives, he must be sharp and stay focused as he tries to figure out who killed who and why. At the same time, he's trying to keep himself from ending up a corpse.

This is such an entertaining character and series. I enjoy the Templar series as well but Jack is just a great character.

Give it a try and you will soon see why!

Netgalley/Severn House  Release Date is September 1, 2017

Jack Blackjack is an absolutely delightful character, and I feel better for having met him. This is without a doubt historical fiction at its finest. Historical, fast paced, but not sacrificing plot to make sure that everything is detailed in the most extreme realism possible. A Murder Too Soon was just incredibly entertaining. What more could a happy reader ask for?

I've read a couple of Jeck's Knight's Templar medieval mysteries and enjoyed them. This is the first in the Jack Blackjack series that I've read, and although it was entertaining enough, I like the other series better.

Instructed to perform the distasteful task of assassinating a lady suspected of being a spy, Jack Blackjack is amazed when he stumbles over the said lady already dead. To keep suspicion off himself, Jack must be on his toes and untangle the multiple threads of deceit that surround him.

This being my first introduction to Jack Blackjack, I was immensely amused by him. I found him to be relatable in how he had second thoughts about his choices. He had doubts about his decision to work for his employer. As many things that went wrong with his life, he just keeps going.

As to the mystery, it had the twists and turns that I love. Jack, to be honest, seemed to stumble over what he needed to work things out in the end.

The plot is delightful. I would recommend this to historical readers who enjoy enjoy tales set before Elizabeth becomes queen.

June 1554, and following the events of a failed rebellion, Jack Blackjack has found himself in the employ of one Thomas Parry as an assassin. There remains the slight problem that he has never actually killed anybody (and doesn’t particularly want to) but other than that, it’s an ideal occupation. Money, wine, women… and then he is sent to Woodstock.
Woodstock is where Queen Mary’s half-sister Elizabeth is staying, not that she has much choice in the matter. There are concerns that a spy has been installed in the Princess’s retinue and Jack has his instructions – kill the spy. Having little choice, he enters the household and promptly trips over the body of the woman that he was supposed to kill. As Jack struggles to find the real killer – and convince his employers that he did commit the crime – it seems that most of the members of the household had a reason to kill the spy. And now it seems that most of them want to kill Jack as well…
Right, let’s get “Twerp-gate” out of the way first. Michael Jecks, the author of this tome and the Knights’ Templar Mysteries or whatever they’re called this week, called me a twerp on Twitter recently. Insulting the reviewer is an interesting strategy from an author, isn’t it?
OK, maybe he had a bit of a point. He tweeted a recommendation for a great mystery novel review site, at which I got excited about a new resource and clicked on the very obvious link to… yes, my own website. And then related this event of twitter. So maybe he had a point…
Anyway, obviously the gloves are off for this one.
Um…
Maybe…
Um…
Bugger, can’t really find anything to moan about here. I could say something about another book set in the Tudor times, but as I mentioned last time – Rebellion’s Message – this is the time of Mary Tudor, a little-mined era for historical mystery fiction. I’m sure we’ll hit Elizabeth’s reign at some point in this hopefully long-running series, but not yet. And as I’m hooked already, I won’t care.
Michael does a clever job differentiating this from his other work. Writing in the first person, from Jack Blackjack’s point of view, he keeps the reader’s interest not just with Jack’s witty reprobate personality, but by only revealing information as Jack discovers it without forcing an information dump on the reader. One example, to explain what I’m trying to say, is this. Early on, Jack is accosted by a large individual. He doesn’t get his name, so refers to him as One-Eye, for reasons you can probably figure out. But once he eventually does find out his name, he still refers to him as One-Eye (occasionally correcting himself) as that’s what he’s got used to doing. That may sound like a small thing, but the narrative is full of that sort of thing.
The other little triumph, apart from the twisty plot and me failing to spot the murderer, is the character of Jack. It’s not easy to make a self-interested, somewhat amoral character a likeable lead, but the author carries it off with aplomb. And there’s a wonderful bit towards the end where I thought for a moment that Jack had gone a bit Poirot just to tidy things up, but by the end of the book, it all made perfect sense.
Released on Wednesday 31st May by Severn House, this is another enjoyable book from one of my favourite authors. Even after calling me a twerp, this is Highly Recommended.