Winner of the Nero Wolfe Award It is 1921 and Mary Russell--Sherlock Holmes's brilliant apprentice, now an Oxford graduate with a degree in theology--is on the verge of acquiring a sizable inheritance. Independent at last, with a passion for divinity and detective work, her most baffling mystery may now involve Holmes and the burgeoning of a deeper affection between herself and the retired detective. Russell's attentions turn to the New Temple of God and its leader, Margery Childe, a charismatic suffragette and a mystic, whose draw on the young theology scholar is irresistible. But when four bluestockings from the Temple turn up dead shortly after changing their wills, could sins of a capital nature be afoot? Holmes and Russell investigate, as their partnership takes a surprising turn in A Monstrous Regiment of Women by Laurie R. King.

In The Monstrous Regiment of Women , Sharon Jansen explores the case for and against female rule by examining the arguments made by theorists from Sir John Fortescue (1461) through Bishop Bossuet (1680) interweaving their arguments with references to the most well-known early modern queens. The 'story' of early modern European political history looks very different if, instead of focusing on kings and their sons, we see successive generations of powerful women and the shifting political alliances of the period from a very different, and revealing, perspective.

The third book in the Mary Russell–Sherlock Holmes series. It is 1923. Mary Russell Holmes and her husband, the retired Sherlock Holmes, are enjoying the summer together on their Sussex estate when they are visited by an old friend, Miss Dorothy Ruskin, an archeologist just returned from Palestine. She leaves in their protection an ancient manuscript which seems to hint at the possibility that Mary Magdalene was an apostle--an artifact certain to stir up a storm of biblical proportions in the Christian establishment. When Ruskin is suddenly killed in a tragic accident, Russell and Holmes find themselves on the trail of a fiendishly clever murderer. A Letter of Mary by Laurie R. King is brimming with political intrigue, theological arcana, and brilliant Holmesian deductions.

"Wickedly satirical . . . nothing short of brilliant.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review) Another ingenious entry in Sir Terry Pratchett’s internationally bestselling Discworld fantasy series about the art of war and the brave women who wage it. War has come to Discworld. The homes and businesses throughout the duchy of Borogravia limp along, doing the best they can without their men, sent to fight their age-old enemy. Polly has taken over the lion’s share of responsibility for the running of her family’s humble inn, The Duchess. Her beloved brother Paul marched off to war almost a year ago, but it has been more than two months since his last letter home, and the news from the front is bad: the fighting has reached the border, supplies are dwindling, and the brave Borogravians are losing precious ground. So the resourceful Polly cuts off her hair and joins the army as a young man named Oliver. As Polly closely guards her secret, she notices that her fellow recruits seem to be guarding secrets of their own. A novel that explores the inanity of war, the ins and outs of sexual politics, and why often the best man for the job is a woman, Monstrous Regiment is vintage Pratchett in top form. The Discworld novels can be read in any order but Monstrous Regiment is a standalone.

The Twentieth-Anniversary Edition of the First Novel of the Acclaimed Mary Russell Series by Edgar Award–Winning Author Laurie R. King. An Agatha Award Best Novel Nominee • Named One of the Century's Best 100 Mysteries by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association In 1915, Sherlock Holmes is retired and quietly engaged in the study of honeybees in Sussex when a young woman literally stumbles onto him on the Sussex Downs. Fifteen years old, gawky, egotistical, and recently orphaned, the young Mary Russell displays an intellect to impress even Sherlock Holmes. Under his reluctant tutelage, this very modern, twentieth-century woman proves a deft protégée and a fitting partner for the Victorian detective. They are soon called to Wales to help Scotland Yard find the kidnapped daughter of an American senator, a case of international significance with clues that dip deep into Holmes's past. Full of brilliant deduction, disguises, and danger, The Beekeeper's Apprentice, the first book of the Mary Russell–Sherlock Holmes mysteries, is "remarkably beguiling" (The Boston Globe).