Mistress Ursula Blanchard fends off yet another suitor looking for her widow's portion of land, and gets on with looking after her home and stud farm, surrounded by loyal servants. The new trotting stallion proves a handful, but that isn't the only turmoil to strike the home near Guildford, Surrey. Someone kidnaps Ursula's young son, and now every stranger is suspect -- the new tutor, the new stud groom, the strolling players. When the ransom demand finally arrives it is astounding and compromising. Ursula is to become THE RELUCTANT ASSASSIN.

In order to save little Harry, the widow is told she must get close to and murder a notable personage. Queen Elizabeth Tudor, her half-sister, has used Ursula as a spy in the past. Ursula has no choice but to tell the Queen and her spymaster Sir Francis Walsingham everything. They may help her, hinder her, or forbid the errand entirely. The politics of the day are complex, involving religious divides, plots, and power struggles.

While the outline seems fanciful, desperate people took desperate measures in Tudor times. As the Queen had not married, her successor was in no way obvious, and many English folks feared an upstart from the Continent or a Scottish Jacobin uprising. Every time power changed hands, nobles lost their lands or their heads. Ordinary folks were dragged into wars and lost their prosperity. In Ursula Blanchard we are presented with a daughter of Henry the Eighth, from the wrong side of the blanket, who is privately recognised and well regarded, working her own way to middle class wealth and attendant upon Court at her Majesty's pleasure. As such she is an excellent tool and an intelligent chronicler of the times.

The times are indeed far from ideal. Scarlet fever kills children. Marauders kill faithful dogs. Ladies are expected to occupy themselves usefully with embroidery. And mysterious accidents happen to witnesses who might know the whereabouts of a captive child. I enjoyed the hospitality; meat and pippin pasties, veal quiche, saffron bread, fresh cider, elderflower wine. I love how individual horses and their abilities are part of everyday life and necessary to adventures. Mistress Blanchard is a totally believable, rounded character, a mother and staunch friend, a horsewoman and good steward of her land and people. If you have not yet read Fiona Buckley's series about Ursula Blanchard, then you have a treasure trove ahead of you. THE RELUCTANT ASSASSIN is the sixteenth book, but I find I can dip in at any point and pick up the threads so skillfully sewn.