THE DEADLY HOURS is a really neat idea for a book. Four authors each write a segment of the story in a different time period, following a cursed watch through episodes of time as it brings misfortune to various owners in its path. Three of these authors are well known to me. I devour books by Susanna Kearsley, C.S. Harris, and Anna Lee Huber the minute they are released. Kearsley writes hauntingly poignant time slip mysteries with romantic elements that I adore. Harris writes an investigator husband and wife Regency mystery series, Sebastien St. Cyr. And Huber is best known for her Lady Darby historical mystery series in the Georgian time period.
"Weapon of Choice" by Susanna Kearsley is the first in the set of four stories, set in 1733. Hugh and Mary are beloved characters from one of her earlier novels, A Desperate Fortune. Hugh and Mary are the first characters in this book to stumble into the sphere of a gold pocket watch called La Sirene. Forged from gold that was “liberated” by French privateers following a siege of Spanish Cartagena, the gold was supposedly cursed by the murdered bishop whose church was ransacked for its treasure. The real value of the watch, despite its exquisite workmanship and extraordinary fineness of its gold, is the provenance of the watch and the curse that it carries. It’s super cool how the watch seems to become its own character in each story, exuding its own menace and causing great havoc.
Hugh and Mary capably protect the Duke of Ormonde from an anti-Jacobite assassin. The watch is supposedly lost with the villain, but shows up next in 1831, in "In a Fevered Hour" by Anna Lee Huber. Lovely Lady Darby and her husband, investigator Sebastien Gage, juggle a Scottish criminal’s demand to help them find the gold watch along with a race to save Edinburgh from a growing typhus pandemic. Then, in 1870, the watch pops up again in "A Pocketful of Death" by Christine Trent. An undertaker discovers the watch in a grave and gives it to the corpse’s descendants. A string of murders devastates the descendant’s neighborhood before the undertaker figures out whom the murderer really is. And finally, in "Siren’s Call" by Harris, the watch is stolen from a small village in England, including the outer case that a World War II enemy aircraft spotter has tucked into his vast collection. An MI5 investigator and the local museum curator team up to track a German spy who has murdered a number of village locals. In each story, one of the four steps necessary to break the curse just happens to occur.
Given that three of these four authors are on my top To-Read list of writers, this book was a no brainer to pick up. The mysteries are nicely fleshed out but contained well within the constraint of a short story format. The touch of a supernatural curse is a fun touch as well. THE DEADLY HOURS is a diverting weaving of historical mystery, intrigue, and superstition, creating a pleasing whole.
A stellar line-up of historical mystery novelists weaves the tale of a priceless and cursed gold watch as it passes through time wreaking havoc from one owner to another. The characters are irrevocably linked by fate, each playing a key role in breaking the curse and destroying the watch once and for all.
From 1733 Italy to Edinburgh in 1831 to a series of chilling murders in 1870 London, and a lethal game of revenge decades later, the watch touches lives with misfortune, until it comes into the reach of one young woman who might be able to stop it for good.
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