City of Shadows is the fifth book in the Counterfeit Lady series. The series tell the story of a con artist who investigates mysteries. This novel tells the story of how Elizabeth and Gideon have recently married, and they have to solve the case of whether the medium is real or fake. I really love Elizabeth and Gideon. They are very fun characters. They are very smart and determined. However, I thought the mystery was a little weak. The mystery was very simple with very little happening. Still, it was a light, cozy mystery! I recommend this for fans of the Molly Murphy Mysteries, Kate Shackleton Mysteries, and Kitty Weeks Mysteries!

Elizabeth Bates used to be a con woman. She’s given it up for love. Unless someone she knows is in trouble. Then, of course, one must do anything one can to help, of course.

Gideon knew what she was when he married her. She’s promised not to involve him and for the most part, keeps her promise. And when she can’t, well the less he knows the better. He never lies and she wouldn’t compromise that aspect of his character.

This time her best friend Anna is in trouble. Anna’s brother died in the flu epidemic several months ago, and their mother is grief stricken. She’s discovered a medium who performs seances. Anna says her mother’s frequent visits to hear messages from beyond will bankrupt them.

Elizabeth’s father and brother are both con men, but the unspoken rule is: a con man never cons another con man. Or woman as in this case. Elizabeth is on her own this time. What starts out to be a simple way to prove Madame no more receives messages from the dead than a lamp post, gets more elaborate each day. Gideon ends up doing his part. Though he won’t admit it, he’s beginning to enjoy a bit of excitement away from his law office.

Madame charges twenty dollars per séance with a six person limit. Although that’s good money for the times, she has bigger plans. While in a ‘trance’, Madame predicts the mourner will soon meet a man who will be able to help them make a fortune, if only they follow his advice. It’s the 1920-ish version of the Nigerian prince email scam. The more Elizabeth hears about the seances, the more she realizes she can’t just plan to discourage Anna’s mother from attending. She has to make sure the fake medium gives up the scam for good.

This is book five in the series. Elizabeth is a delightful character as she tries to fit in with society’s expectations but never can quite pull it off, through no fault of her own. She can’t be blamed for wanting to help others. She’s also encouraged by Gideon’s mother, Anna, and other friends who find a con great entertainment. It’s a series I always enjoy.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced copy of City of Shadows.

I’ve read all of the Counterfeit Lady novels and I’m sad to say, this is my least favorite. I found it boring, slow moving and repetitive. I generally enjoy books with seances but felt like this was a slight repeat from one of her Gaslight Mystery novels.

It was fun to see Gideon drawn into a con. Elizabeth kept him on the outside but present as she, friends and family proceeded to con the con artist. Great story, wonderful plot and fun as well. This series stays on my TBR list.

City of Shadows is the Fifth installment in author Victoria Thompson's Counterfeit Lady series. Elizabeth Miles Bates has returned from her honeymoon cruise with Gideon Bates and is taking great pride in having completely forsaken her past life as a con artist. In fact, she's putting in a whole lot of effort working with her mother-in-law Hazel Bates pushing President Woodrow Wilson to pass to the 19th Amendment now that the Republican party has control of Congress. Elizabeth and Hazel have already been victim of Wilson's hatred of the suffrage women as we witnessed in the first installment in this series.

Then her friend, Anna Vanderslice, who has played her part in helping Jake and Elizabeth, begs her to use her talents to help save her widowed mother from a disreputable medium called Madame Ophelia. Since the war and the flu epidemic left so many families bereaved, interest in contacting the dead has experienced a revival. Once quite popular, seances have come back into vogue as desperate families mourn their loved ones and long to communicate with them. Anna's mother has been attending seances in an attempt to contact her son, David, who died of influenza.

Anna had thought it a harmless activity, though a heartbreaking one, but she has just learned that Mrs. Vanderslice is paying the medium ever-increasing sums of money in her eagerness to make contact with her deceased son. Since David's death has caused Anna and her mother financial hardship already, Mrs. Vanderslice's obsession is in danger of ruining them. Madame Ophelia is part of a group of con artists, including Persephone, working together to fleece as many New Yorker's as possible before moving onto another city. Several of Mrs. Vanderslice's friends as well as some of Gideon's clients have already been victimized.

Elizabeth knows that simply exposing the medium as a fraud will not be enough, and the only way to get at least some of the stolen money back is to con the medium and her cohorts. But will Elizabeth's family help her when it means betraying other con artists? And who can they trust? No one, as it happens, so Elizabeth turns to her aunt, Cybil, and Cybil's partner, Zelda, for help. Although Cybil disapproves of her family's shady profession, she is more than happy to lend a hand. Can Elizabeth and her gang of amateurs fool the professionals?

The author also introduces a new secondary character to the mix who is important to Anna; Frederica Quincy. They are both in college together, and Freddie seems as though she really likes Anna. Freddie gets involved with Elizabeth's brother Jake in conning one of the members of Madame Ophelia's ring of con artists and boy is she right on point with her antics. She fits right in with Elizabeth, Jake, and the Old Man when it comes to going after people who con the wrong people. I will be interested to see if Freddie sticks around or not. This book once again has multiple points of view from Elizabeth, to Jake, to Gideon who is once again dragged into Elizabeth's attempts to rid the world of bad con artists.

Elizabeth Bates returns from her honeymoon with Gideon to find that her friend's mother is being conned out of her small savings by Madam Ophelia, a fake medium in City of Shadows. New York in the 1920's is full of con artists and financial flim flam. Elizabeth recruits her family and friends to out con the con artist and get the money back. Humorous historical mystery well worth reading.

Brought to you by OBS Reviewer Daniele

In this delightful historical set in New York City 1919, City of Shadows finds former con artist Elizabeth back in the game trying to help her friend Anna expose medium Madame Ophelia’s and save her clients from financial ruin.

In the wake of so much loss from World War I and the devastating flu epidemic, séances have come back in vogue as people attempt to communicate with deceased family and friends. Newlywed Elizabeth has sworn off her former con artist life, but when her best friend Anna comes to her for help, how can she say no? Anna’s mother is spending increasing amounts of money in hopes of hearing from her son David through medium Madame Ophelia. In addition to the emotional toll it is taking, Anna and her mother do not have the money to spare. Elizabeth suddenly develops the gift of spiritual communication in an effort to get close to Madame Ophelia. With the help of her friends, brother, aunt, and even her straight laced estate attorney husband Gideon, Elizabeth does her best to con a con.

City of Shadows is my favorite Counterfeit Lady book to date. There is something so amusing about the protagonist Elizabeth’s goal of one-upping someone who is taking advantage of others. Author Victoria Thompson succeeds at weaving a complicated, yet easy to follow, deception that reminds me a bit of movies like Ocean’s Eleven. Elizabeth has a wonderful heart, is smart as a whip, and is an excellent con artist despite her best efforts to keep away. Since her father and brother are in the business, she has learned many tricks of the trade. With the cooperation of Gideon, Jake, Aunt Cybil, and other connections, she lays out a plan to convince Madame Ophelia that Elizabeth is the real deal, and every one of her predictions comes to fruition. It all is so charming and entertaining; I was engaged in the story from the first page to the last.

As fun as the plot is, it is the characters’ relationships that are so compelling. I particularly enjoy Elizabeth’s relationship with her mother-in-law. So often MILs are portrayed as evil ogres, but here Mother Bates and Elizabeth are great friends and co-conspirators. Elizabeth and her brother Jake’s exchanges offer diverting sibling banter. I love that law abiding, exceedingly honest Gideon not only supports Elizabeth in her endeavors but gamely has his own important part to play.

City of Shadows is quite enjoyable. Highly recommended to mystery readers looking for a change of pace (no murder) and any historical fiction fan.

Newlywed Elizabeth Miles Bates is enjoying her new life in 1919 New York City, but she has to call upon her conman roots when her friend Anna Vanderslice comes to her for help. Anna’s mother has started going to a medium, spending money they don’t have in their budget to do so. Elizabeth quickly confirms that the medium is a fake, and her husband, Gideon, figures out that there is more to the plot than Elizabeth originally thought. Can she figure out how to stop the medium?

I enjoy this series since the caper storylines are a break from the mysteries I normally read. This one was a bit more straightforward than some of the others, but I still enjoyed every page, and there were a few branches to the plot I didn’t expect. Another draw to this series is the characters. They are their usual charming selves here. The multiple viewpoints add to the fun since some of the reactions to the events are funny. Yet, the characters have some real depth to them and I love seeing how they are growing as the series progresses. If you are looking for a little something different in a crime novel, this is one you’ll enjoy.

I love this author's books. I enjoy the characters, setting, and mysteries. I also love the con that solves the problem. Sometimes I have a hard time following them, but that makes the wrap up so much more interesting to me.

Thank you to the author, publisher and NetGalley for my eARC in exchange for an honest review.

If readers worried marriage would dull Elizabeth, they will be pleased to see she's still at the art of the con in City of Shadows. While there are more issues in the balance now, Elizabeth will still see to it that no one she cares about will be the victim of a con artist- not when she and her associates have plenty of experience and resources to con them right back. This one draws on seances and mediums and is a quick and entertaining read.

Thanks to the publishers and NetGalley for a digital ARC of this title in exchange for an honest review. I actually started this series a whole TWO weeks ago and devoured my way to this title. Love it! Love all of it. Wonderful story, love seeing Elizabeth using her skills for good. I keep hoping for a crossover of her other series (even if it's just a minor character!) but I don't think the timelines overlap properly.
I'm always fascinated by the idea of séances and conning and mysticism during this time period. Thompson did a wonderful job of creating the atmosphere and desperation that so many people faced after the Great War and the flu, to be able to communicate with their loved ones. People were so frantic and willing to believe anything, just to feel some closure or relief. I love seeing all of the overlapping parts of the cons come together, and I've loved seeing the various characters develop over the series. Having Anna and Jake be close friends and NOTHING more is refreshing and sticks to the true character/person that Anna is. Loved this, can hardly wait for the next one!!

"City of Shadows" is a historical set in 1919 in New York City. This is the fifth book in the series. You don't need to read the previous books to understand this one, and this book didn't spoil the previous novels. The historical details were woven into the story to create a sense of the specific time and place as well as bring the story alive.

Elizabeth is a reformed con artist married to Gideon, an honorable lawyer who refuses to lie. Elizabeth and her family has learned how to use his honesty to help in their right-a-wrong cons, and Elizabeth's friends were more than happy to be a part of the fun. The reader isn't told the plans before they happen, so there's an element of mystery and suspense. But we see events as they happen and know the overall goal, so it's fun guessing how the cons are going to go. It was very entertaining and humorous to see each of the interconnected cons being pulled off.

There was no sex or bad language. Overall, I'd highly recommend this entertaining historical novel.

How do you con a con artist? That is the question in this addition to the Counterfeit Lady series. Elizabeth takes on the challenge to save Anna's mother from loosing all their money. Fun from start to finish it is a joy to spend more time with Elizabeth and her friends and family.