While she's vacationing at a Scottish estate, Lady Emily's trip turns sinister when the gamekeeper is murdered. Emily investigates the many suspects, including Sinclair's abandoned fiancée, a jealous rival, and the woman shamelessly pursuing him. Darkness lurks in the idyllic Highland village as she uncovers illicit affairs and village secrets tied to a centuries-old witchcraft trial.

Agatha Christie fans will love Lady Emily! With a clever plot, intriguing characters, and the comic relief of the heroine's children, this is an entertaining and engrossing audiobook. The narration complemented the story.

Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC I received. This is my honest and voluntary review.

I don't typically gravitate toward historically-set mysteries, but I've had a thing for stories set in Scotland lately, and this drew me in immediately. I didn't even realize that this was part of a series, so it can definitely be read as a standalone. The narrator did a great job with the variety of ages and accents of the characters.

There were certain points that the pace was a bit slow, but not enough to want to stop reading. The mystery was engaging, the characters were very easy to enjoy reading, and I was kept guessing as to who the culprit was until the end.

A well written , sophisticated murder mystery — there are two storylines — 1676 Tansy and a story of slavery and witchcraft — and 1905—Lady Emily — solving a murder in this time period and how what happened int 1676 might be connected to what is happening in the village in 1905.

The narrator is quite good with the male, female and child voices— I enjoyed it as an audiobook. The threading of the two stories was well done and though this is book 17 in the series it was easy to pick it up as a stand alone .

It is a slow burn , but the layout makes it enjoyable — and both storylines were intriguing — though I was really wondering how they would be connected until 80% into the story.

The ending was not what I expected - but I found this story very interesting and it held my intrigue the whole way through.
I would try more books by this authors books - Recommended !

Thank you to Netgalley and McMillan Audio for this ARC . This is my honest review .

Lady Emily returns along with her husband and their three sons on a family vacation to estate and the Scottish highlands. Their vacation turns deadly when the game keeper is murdered, and the man had no lack of enemies. The man was a shameless Lothario, he left behind a trail of broken hearts and angry rivals. the big question surrounds the runic stone left on the man’s forehead. Lady Emily must look into the history of the castle when rumors of witchcraft left the then, Lady of the Castle on trial for her very life. Another winning entry in this well researched series.