A great book by a fantastic author. The writing is excellent and the mystery keeps you turning the pages. Characters are well developed. Highly recommend.

A great historical mystery fiction that plays the traditional gender roles of the era it is set in, however, the author makes it work. Highly recommend to fans of the genre!

I really enjoyed this well-written mystery set in the early 1900s in London
Although some might classify this as a cozy, I felt the strong leading character (a suffragette and daughter of a marquis) and the convincing setting elevated the story and kept it from falling into twee cuteness.
This was a well-researched book and I look forward to reading other mysteries in this series

3.5 Stars for this period mystery. While I found some of the suffragette and Sherlock Holmes references overused, overall this was a clever, twisty mystery with intelligent female leads.

This book was enjoyable and intriguing. I really liked all of the characters, particularly Lady Frances and her maid. It reminded me a bit of Deanna Raybourn's Veronica Speedwell series or the Lady Hardcastle series by Kinsey. if you enjoy historical fiction, this is a great addition to the mystery genre in this time period. I suspect this will become a series and I will pick up the others at some point as well.

Lady Frances Ffolkes is one of those heroines that can be expected to do the unexpected, and this book is no exception. It's the third in the series, and author R.J. Koreto has hit his stride with all the goings-on in this engaging and cleverly plotted thriller. He's also very good at managing to create a sense of time and place that is consistent with the historical period being portrayed, while, ensuring Lady Ffolkes is up to date in her thoughts and sensibilities.

I really like the setting of this series. Edwardian England is truly a time of change and this really lets Lady Frances have a lot of leeway in sleuthing in the theater world.

A good Edwardian mystery with a satisfying conclusion pulled straight from a classic sensation novel. Though it felt oddly paced and dragged at times, Frances and Mallow make for an excellent lead pair and I loved their encounters with real life characters.

R. J. Koreto continues Lady Frances Ffolkes mysteries with Death at the Emerald. In Edwardian London Lady Frances, the daughter of a marquess, supports the suffragists and sets up as an investigative detective when she is commissioned to find the daughter Lady Torrence missing for 30 years. Hellen had vanished from her aristocratic home, become an actress at the Emerald Theatre and then vanished after her husband was murdered. Where is she? Dead? Interesting plot and setting. Lots of suspects.

While I loved the setting and the time period, for some reason the characters just didn't connect with me this time around

Consulting detective, Lady (marquess’s daughter), a bride-to-be, a leader of suffragist movement all rolled into one very beautiful, smart and resourceful young woman.

Would I read more of her adventures? Definitely.

Lady Frances knows everything and everyone in London. She can get on with maids and the King himself. She can uncover truth and secrets in a truly Sherlockian style.

I loved to read about her adventures, even though the narration was a bit too long in places.

The Death at the Emerald is long book. It is not one of your ‘quick reads’. You have to think and follow the thread all the time. Otherwise, you will get lost in all the name, clues and secrets.

You’d get a wonderful picture of London’s Society life on the brink of 20th century, including all the progressive and regressive bits and tidbits. You’d also get a non-intrusive insight into upstairs-downstairs relationships of those times. And, of course, you’d get a mystery stretching years and years until Lady Frances came along and unraveled it all.

All in all, everything ends well for almost everyone in this story. Lady Frances wins it all, including a wonderful fiancee. (Note to the lovers of chick lit – Fiancee here, as well as the relationship itself, is not the end goal and all consuming passion. It is a relationship of equals, a quiet but steady fire that will burn for a long time).

Read on or read ahead. You’ll love it.

Thanks to Crooked Lane and netgalley for this ARC.

Frances Ffolkes captivates, frustrates, and will keep you coming back for more each time. Love the frenetic energy of this series.

I have had quite the winning streak lately with mysteries and I am pleased to report that this latest read kept that streak firmly alive. While I love a historical mystery they can at times be a little dry and a little slow. This was neither. I was immediately pulled into Lady Frances' world and couldn't wait to find out just what had happened to Helen all those years ago.

Lady Frances is an interesting detective. She is very much of the aristocracy and has no qualms about using her status and connections to help her case. She is very much aware that her behavior is at best unusual and at worst incredibly scandalous but simply chooses to ignore this. Her relationship with her maid/assistant Mallow is also on the unusual side. While Mallow is much more traditional than Lady Frances she is a good investigator in her own right and I enjoyed the brainstorming sessions and other interactions between maid and mistress.

The mystery is highly entertaining and incredibly engaging. While I had theories on some aspects I was completely in the dark about others. When it all came out I was just as surprised as any character in the book.

This was my first book in the Lady Frances Ffolkes series but it will not be my last. I'm glad I have the previous two books to catch up on while I wait for the fourth.

I’ve encountered few historicals as cleverly plotted as RJ Koreto’s Death at the Emerald. Lady France's Ffolkes is an innovator, a feminist who uses her position to challenge convention, just as her lady’s maid Mallow is the perfect servant - a supporter and confidant who pairs acceptable behavior with acting as Lady Frances’s “Watson”.  Koreto skillfully paints a picture of a society in the midst of change, a society where class means everything.

Lady France's Ffolkes is asked to investigate the disappearance of a young woman 30 years previous.  Her family assumes she is dead, but one family friend wants Lady Frances to uncover the truth behind the young beauty’s disappearance.  The trail begins at the Emerald Theater and leads them on a merry chase that begins and ends with murder.  Expect to meet a few historical figures and see how a motion picture is made.  It is an intriguing mystery where women’s issues play an important role.

I highly recommend Death at the Emerald to anyone who enjoys historical mysteries, particularly those set in Edwardian times.

5 / 5

I received a copy of Death at the Emerald from the publisher and Netgalley.com in exchange for an honest review.

--Crittermom

I really enjoyed this third installment of the Lady Frances Folkes Mysteries, where Lady Frances becomes a female consulting detective (I'm sure the first one ever in Edwardian England) in order to locate the daughter of an old family friend. Because she is known as being unconventional and sometimes scandalous to her high society peers, Lady Frances is able to go places where no well-born lady would go, and engage in somewhat questionable activities, such as taking a jujitsu class with a famous actress! She is still very dedicated to her suffrage for women cause, but it takes a back burner to her investigation. With her maid, June Mallow (her Watson), at her side, Lady Frances infiltrates the world of the theater with great panache, and even finds herself and Mallow as bit actors in moving pictures.

The mystery of the missing woman is quite captivating, and the stakes are high as Lady Frances will stop at nothing to solve it. From the theater to graveyards at midnight, Scotland Yard, and a mysterious stalker, Death at the Emerald holds your attention to the very end, and is certainly a page turner. Lady Frances is a breath of fresh air in proper London society, and is always quick with a wonderful comeback or clever response. Although this is the third book in the Lady Frances Fflokes mysteries, it can definitely stand alone, but I know it will whet your appetite to start at the beginning of the series and see the development of her character. I recommend this book highly and without reservation.

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Thirty years ago Lady Beatrice Torrence and her husband disowned their daughter when she became an actress. She comes to Lady Frances Ffolkes for help finding her daughter before she dies. The mystery will take her into the world of the theater and into a myster decades old.

Frances once again teams up with her maid Mallow but this time her husband-to-be also plays some part. I like Hal; he seems like the progressive sort of husband a bicycle-riding suffragette would need.

This was a nice addition to the series. It was a little over the top in places but mostly an enjoyable book that I think regular readers will enjoy.



Three stars

This book came out November 7

ARC provided by NetGalley

Thirty years after her daughter had disappeared Lady Beatrice Torrence decides it's time to find out if she is still alive. To this end she employs Lady Frances Fflokes to find her with the one clue that she had run away to be an actress. But it is not long before murder is done
An enjoyable, well written mystery, which can easily read as a stand-alone novel.

I would like to thank NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for providing a copy of this book in exchange for a review.

Lady Frances Ffolkes is a most unconventional character in Edwardian England. She is a suffragist who studies martial arts and prefers to travel through the city by bicycle rather than carriage. She has been involved in several investigations and has now settled into the role of private detective. Just as Sherlock had Watson, Lady Frances has Mallow, her maid who assists her on her inquiries.

In R.J. Koreto’s third installment in this series, Lady Frances is hired by Lady Torrence to find her daughter Louisa, who disappeared thirty years earlier. Louisa is traced to the Emerald Theater, where she changed her name to Helen. She was a beautiful addition to the Green Players and captured the hearts of four men at the theater. The four made an agreement to support whoever she chose, but when she chooses the theater’s accountant, one of them breaks the pact. With her husband murdered, Helen disappears. When Lady Frances begins asking questions at the Emerald, one of Helen’s former suitors is murdered and she finds herself being followed by a threatening figure. She is not one to give up and is determined to discover Louisa’s fate and put Lady Torrence’s mind at rest.

Koreto uses illusion and misdirection to hide the identity of Lady Frances’ stalker and Helen’s fate. The investigation takes her behind the scenes at the theater and into a studio in the early days of motion pictures. Her discoveries are often surprising and she reveals her solution using stagecraft at the Emerald. Fans of Sherry Thomas’ Lady Sherlock series or Deanna Raybourn’s Veronica Speedwell series will find an irresistible character in Lady Frances Ffolkes.

Decent historical mystery with only a few irritating modern elements included to keep the modern reader entertained. Lady Frances Ffolkes finds herself enmeshed in a murder in the theater world, which I had always understood from my reading of history to be a scandalous part of London in Edwardian times, but which is treated here as only mildly unacceptable.

Plot is linear with no obvious red herrings, but the solution was very easy to guess.
Characters are likable, but none were so endearing as to make me really care for them to the point of wanting to read every title in the series. Likable enough that if I stumble across another title while looking for a light read, I'd probably go ahead and buy it.
Some weird verb choices slipped by the editor: "She'd let the theater man stew for a while." Stewing implies some adversarial relationship, or a more intense one at any rate than has yet been established in the book, when these two have not even met. Better to just say "She'd let the theater man wait and wonder for a while.." Some other choices for vernacular dialogue seemed very modern, but I could be wrong. "And who is this?" at location 613--an example of not quite correct Edwardian behavior. It would have been obvious she was a maid (the author has just told us of the difference in their attire) and therefore not to be noticed by a social superor or one pretending to be her superior.

My biggest complaint--when Frances and Mallow stole the box from the dressing room immediately after the murder. There is a brief acknowledgment that this was illegal, but their blithe dismissal of having broken the law and committed a crime they could be sent to jail for really bothered me, I absolutely hate it when characters act like this, when there are no consequences, and the author takes this lazy way out to further the story. The fact that it happened so early int he book did color my reaction to it.

Lady Frances Ffolkes and her intrepid maid/assistant Miss Mallow have another case. Lady Torrance has heard about Frances's previous cases and has hired her to locate her daughter who ran away from home about thirty years earlier.

Lady Frances's investigations take her into London's theater world where Louisa fled taking the stage name of Helen. While Frances finds men who loved her, Helen is long gone. When Helen learns that one of the men who loved her has been killed, she knows that she is on the right track.

Lady Frances and Mallow investigate and try to retrace Helen's path. There are secrets within secrets in this story complicated by the fact that theater folks are used to illusions, secrets, and disguises. Meanwhile, Frances is considering how her work as London's first female private investigator is going to mesh with her marriage to a prominent solicitor.

The setting was great. I enjoyed the mystery and thought it was a nicely complex story. I enjoyed the glimpse into the motion picture industry. I also enjoy that Frances is a suffragist while still being part of the upper class and not even really realizing how privileged her life is.

Fans of historical mysteries will enjoy this one.