Let us Talk of Many Things; of Books and Queens and Pirates, of Mystery and Kings...: 2025

Monday, 1 December 2025

Serious about a Series: Alison Morton

Good Books - Good Series...

Good Ideas for a Christmas or

Birthday Gift!

Today: Alison Morton

About the Books

What if a part of the Ancient Roman Empire had survived to the present and was ruled by women?

Courageous, loyal and passionate, Carina and Aurelia fight to keep Roma Nova safe from conspiracy, deception, rebels and vengeance takers and to find true comradeship and love.

Book 1

"It’s about Roman blood, survival and money. Mostly yours."

A killer with a personal vendetta is hunting New Yorker Karen Brown. Desperate, she makes a snap decision to flee to Roma Nova – her late mother’s homeland and the last remnant of the Roman Empire in the 21st century. But survival in this tough, unfamiliar culture isn’t easy.

Stifled by her powerful Roma Novan family, deceived by her new lover, yet determined to prove herself, she launches into a dangerous mission – one that could cost her everything. When the killer sets the ultimate trap, she faces an impossible choice: abandon another or sacrifice herself.

A gripping blend of thriller, romance, and coming-of-age, this alternative history novel reimagines Ancient Rome’s legacy through the eyes of a courageous young woman who learns that to survive she must stand her ground.

"Eve Dallas meets Lindsey Davis’s Roman detective Falco meets The Hunger Games."

– B.R.A.G. Medallion honoree

– Shortlisted for the International Rubery Book Award

– Finalist in Writing Magazine Self-Published Book of the Year

"Grips like a vice – a writer to watch out for" – Adrian Magson

What readers say...

"But it's the originality that's off the scale." – Angelica Reads ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"Exciting and an intriguing pleasure for anyone with a fondness for Old Rome" – Vine Voice ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"5 stars doesn't do it justice. If I could give it 6 stars, I would." – London Lass ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"She'll be giving Marcus Didius Falco a run for his money in the Roman crime genre, even if the eras are two millennia apart." – Antoine ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

"I can't wait to see where this series goes next, and if a real Roma Nova ever emerges, sign me up." - Sîan ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

More books in the series

The Carina strand

INCEPTIO where New Yorker Karen Brown is thrown into a new life in mysterious Roma Nova and fights to stay alive with a killer hunting her..

CARINA, a novella, Carina’s first mission abroad. What could possibly go wrong?

PERFIDITAS, six years on, where betrayal and rebellion are in the air, and threaten to topple Roma Nova and ruin Carina’s life.

SUCCESSIO, where a mistake from the past threatens to destroy the next generation.

Carina Omnibus, the above four adventures brought together in one ebook box set

The Aurelia strand

AURELIA, in late 1960s Roma Nova, Aurelia Mitela battles silver smuggling and illegal trading and must make the heartbreaking choice between her love, her child and her country…

NEXUS Mid 1970s, London, where a simple favour for a friend becomes a chilling pursuit across Europe

INSURRECTIO, where Aurelia Mitela struggles against a manipulative tyrant grabbing power. But it may already be too late to save Roma Nova…

RETALIO, a classic tale of resistance and retribution – the endgame between Aurelia and Caius

Aurelia Omnibus, the above four adventures brought together in one ebook box set

The Foundation Stories

JULIA PRIMA, set in AD 370 in Roman Noricum riven with political and religious strife. Prince’s daughter Julia meets Lucius Apulius and their world will change forever.

EXSILIUM, set between AD 383 and 395, when three Romans face the idea of exile – traditionally a living death. Or is it a chance for survival?

Extras

ROMA NOVA EXTRA, a collection of short stories from AD 370 to the present

Author bio

Alison Morton writes award-winning thrillers featuring tough but compassionate heroines.

Her eleven-book Roma Nova thriller series is set in an imaginary European country where a remnant of the ancient Roman Empire has survived into the 21st century and is ruled by women who face conspiracy, revolution and heartache but with a sharp line in dialogue

Six years’ military service, a fascination with ancient Rome and a life of reading crime, historical and thriller fiction have inspired her writing. On the way, she collected a BA in modern languages and an MA in history.

She lives in Poitou in France, the home of Mélisende, the heroine of her latest two contemporary thrillers, Double Identity and Double Pursuit.

Buy links

Amazon series link: https://mybook.to/RomeNovaSeries

INCEPTIO multiple retailer link: https://books2read.com/INCEPTIO

Social media links

Website/blog: https://www.alison-morton.com

Newsletter sign up (Get a free book!): https://www.alison-morton.com/newsletter/

Facebook author page: https://www.facebook.com/AlisonMortonAuthor

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The SEA WITCH VOYAGES

nautical adventures with a touch of supernatural

set during the Golden Age of Piracy

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Saturday, 29 November 2025

Rachel's Random Resources Book Tour of: Death of a Billionaire by Tucker May

Rachel's Random Resources
Book Tours

Welcome to my Blog!
Wander through worlds
real and fictional,
meet interesting people,
visit exciting places
and find good books
to enjoy along the way!

About the Book

Death of a Billionaire

Ever dream of killing your boss? Alan Benning knows how you feel.

The problem: his billionaire boss actually winds up murdered. And the whole world thinks he did it.

When globetrotting tech billionaire Barron Fisk is found dead on the floor of his swanky Silicon Valley office, all evidence points to Alan.

Alan must venture into the glitzy, treacherous world of tech billionaires to clear his name by sorting through a long list of suspects with motive aplenty. If he can’t find the real culprit, Alan’s going down. The clock is ticking.

Who killed Barron Fisk? The truth will shock— and change— the entire world.

Fans of Richard Osman’s The Thursday Murder Club series, Carl Hiaasen’s tales of high-stakes hijinx, or Ruth Ware’s page-turning mysteries will love Death of a Billionaire.

Purchase Links

https://www.amazon.com/Death-Billionaire-Murder-Mystery-Novel-ebook/dp/B0FRYHLBBZ

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Death-Billionaire-Murder-Mystery-Novel-ebook/dp/B0FRYHLBBZ

Author Bio – Tucker May was raised in southern Missouri. He attended Northwestern University where he was trained in acting and playwriting. He now lives in Pasadena, California with his wife Barbara and their cat Principal Spittle. He is an avid reader and longtime fan of the Los Angeles Rams and Geelong Cats. Death of a Billionaire is his debut novel.

Social Media Links –

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tuckermaymysteries/

BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/tuckermaymysteries.bsky.social

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61556491591135

Read an extract

Death of a Billionaire tells the story of Alan Benning, a timid numbers man who is accused of murdering the world's most famous tech billionaire. Alan must comb through a long list of potential suspects with motive aplenty to find the true culprit and save himself. Below is an extract from Chapter Nine, when Alan and his unlikely partner in solving the crime go to confront their first suspect. The suspect is Aristotle Cunningham, another tech billionaire and chief rival to the man who was murdered. Enjoy!

Extract:

Sharla jabbed Alan in the back and muttered to him from the corner of her mouth, “Go greet him.”

Alan whispered back, “I’ve never talked to a murderer before.”

“We don’t know anything yet for sure. We only strongly suspect that he’s a murderer.”

“Gee, how comforting.”

Cunningham, out of earshot, watched the two of them with an unwavering smile. Sharla poked Alan in the back again, which finally got him going. He clomped into Cunningham’s entryway with heavy feet and shook the rich man’s hand. He must have looked pained at doing so because Cunningham’s expression twisted into a faux frown.

“Come now,” said Cunningham. “Why so glum? Would it cheer you up if I promised to pay your legal fees? After all, you’ve done me a great favor.”

“I . . . No. I didn’t . . . I never . . . What I mean is . . .” Alan stumbled until Sharla came up behind him and spat it out.

“Alan didn’t actually kill Mr. Fisk.”

“Sure you didn’t.” Cunningham gave a playful wink before pivoting to Sharla. “Hi. I’m Aristotle Cunningham.”

“Of course. Everyone knows who you are. I’m Sharla Johnson.”

“Oh! Fisk’s assistant, right? Not here to steal any trade secrets, are you?”

“No, definitely not.”

“Well, that makes sense. Since Fisk is dead.” Cunningham let out a bark of a laugh and clapped his thigh. “Hey, anybody want some homemade kombucha? My butler infuses it with fresh honey from my apiary, and it’s made in the same barrel used for the first batch of Guinness beer back in the 1700s. I won it at an auction in the Maldives.”

“No, thank you,” Alan said. “We actually have a few questions for you if we could take up a bit of your time.”

“Sure thing, but I’ll have to ask you to follow me to the shark room. You caught me in the middle of feeding time.”

“Sorry, did you say shark room?” Sharla asked.

“That’s right.”

Sharla and Alan glanced at one another.

“Like, shark sharks?” Alan asked this time. “Like the big angry fish?”

“Oh, sharks aren’t angry. They are fish, though, so good on you. Many people think they’re mammals, but they’re not. They’re special fish of the superorder Selachimorpha with bodily structures that are cartilaginous rather than ossified. They’re majestic.”

“And . . . you have some in your home?” Sharla sought clarity one more time.

“Of course,” Cunningham replied without the slightest acknowledgement that it might be strange. “In the shark room. Where do you keep your sharks?”

“I don’t . . . Uh, never mind.”

Cunningham marched off with long strides. Alan and Sharla trailed behind, marveling at the sizable pieces of artwork that hung on the smooth, pristine walls of the long hallway down which Cunningham led them: Picasso, Degas, Rothko. Cunningham pointed out specific doors to his guests as they walked past.

“That door leads to the indoor pickleball court. That one is a bathroom. That’s a specialized seed vault I had built to incubate the next generation of my moonflowers. Did you see my moonflowers? I’m sure you did. Brandon is required to point them out to everybody. That door is a bathroom. This one here is a room with trampoline floors; that’s just for fun. Surprisingly good workout, too. That door used to be a guest room, but now it’s overflow storage for pool toys and floaties. Here is another bathroom.”

“You sure have a lot of bathrooms,” Sharla said.

Cunningham stopped in his tracks and turned to face them. He spoke with a sudden and urgent seriousness.

“Every third door in this house is a bathroom. A man can never have too many bathrooms.”

“Oh. Isn’t that nice,” Sharla said. Seemingly satisfied, he turned and led the way again.

“We’re almost there!” he sang back to them.

He stopped in front of a set of broad wooden doors and flung them open. Inside loomed the largest aquarium tank that Alan or Sharla had ever seen. It housed between ten and twelve great white sharks that swam in large, lazy circles.

“Hell’s bells,” Alan whispered to himself.

Cunningham approached a wide, clear tube that ran down the front of the tank and pressed a button next to it. As soon as he did, a bookcase built into the wall to their right, apparently a secret door, swung open and a young man wearing the same crisp vest as the valet rushed in pushing a wheelbarrow full of what appeared to be chopped up sheep carcasses. He left the bloody wheelbarrow next to the tank tube and scurried out again, the wall re-sealing itself as if by magic.

Cunningham put on a pair of long rubber gloves, grabbed a large hunk of meat, and shoved it into the clear tube, which sucked it upward and dropped it into the water with a splash. The sharks swarmed as Cunningham looked on with approval.

“The big one’s my favorite. I named him Shark Ruffalo.”

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Friday, 28 November 2025

Rachel's Random Resources Book Tours A Husband Is Hushed Up by Helen Golden

Rachel's Random Resources
Book Tours

Welcome to my Blog!
Wander through worlds
real and fictional,
meet interesting people,
visit exciting places
and find good books
to enjoy along the way!

About the Book

A Husband is Hushed Up

A fatal fall. A duchess determined to uncover the truth. And barely any time for tea.

Fenshire, 1891. It was meant to be a birthday celebration weekend in the country—cucumber sandwiches, polite conversation, and maybe a waltz or two. But when the Duke of Stortford is found dead in a crumpled heap at the foot of the stairs everything goes dreadfully sideways. The police declare it a tragic accident. His wife, Alice, has her doubts. After all, only hours before, the Duke had promised to give up his mistress and make a go of their marriage. Now he’s inconveniently deceased.

Driven by a need for answers, and helped by her fiercely loyal maid Maud, her observant footman George, and her childhood friend Lord Rushton, Alice sets about uncovering the truth. But as she navigates a house full of secrets, simmering tensions, and more than one guest with murderously bad manners, her suspect pool grows to include those closest to her. Can she piece together the truth? Or will her husband’s murderer get away with it after all?

The guests are leaving. The killer may be among them. Time is running out…

Purchase Links

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Husband-Hushed-Duchess-Stortford-Mystery-ebook/dp/B0FB916FDV

https://www.amazon.com/Husband-Hushed-Duchess-Stortford-Mystery-ebook/dp/B0FB916FDV

About Helen Golden

Helen Golden spins mysteries that are charmingly British, delightfully deadly, and served with a twist of humour.

With quirky characters, clever red herrings, and plots that keep the pages turning, she’s the author of the much-loved A Right Royal Cozy Investigation series, following Lady Beatrice and her friends—including one clever little dog—as they uncover secrets hidden in country houses and royal palaces. Her new historical mystery series, The Duchess of Stortford Mysteries, is set in Victorian England and introduces an equally curious sleuth from Lady Beatrice’s own family tree—where murders are solved over cups of tea, whispered gossip, and overheard conversations in drawing rooms and grand estates.

Helen lives in a quintessential English village in Lincolnshire with her husband, stepdaughter, and a menagerie of pets—including a dog, several cats, a tortoise, and far too many fish.

If you love clever puzzles, charming settings, and sleuths with spark, her books are waiting for you.

Follow Helen Golden

Insta: https://www.instagram.com/helengolden_author

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/helengoldenauthor

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@helengoldenauthor

https://twitter.com/HelenGoldenAuth

read an excerpt

A Husband is Hushed Up by Helen Golden — Let us talk of many things

It’s May 1891. Alice, Duchess of Stortford, has travelled to Fenshire to her family’s estate, Francis Court, to celebrate her father’s 60^th birthday. But it’s all a bit awkward. Alice’s husband, Vance, is also there with his rumoured paramour. After much swallowing on pride on both Alice and Vance’s parts, and a fair amount of negotiating, they agree to give their marriage another chance. But when a scream pierces the quiet of the night, Alice and her loyal maid, Maud, rush into the darkened corridors to investigate, what they discover on the grand staircase will alter the course of Alice’s life—and set her on a path that will test both her courage and her instincts for uncovering the truth.

Extract

She wiped her hand across her forehead as she sat up. All was quiet.

I must have been dreaming. Unless, of course… A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. Unless it was the ghost of Agnes, the seventh Duchess of Arnwall, who, rumour had it, roamed the house—

A high, desperate shriek drifted up from somewhere below.

That’s no ghost!

She reached for the tasselled cord beside the bed and gave it a firm tug, then swung her legs over the side of the mattress, wincing as her bare feet touched the cold floor. She snatched up her silk wrap from the bedpost, and slipping her feet into her velvet slippers, she padded across the room towards the door. As she reached for the handle, the door swung open, revealing a wide-eyed Maud on the other side.

“You rang, Your Grace,” her maid said, her chestnut curls in disarray. “Are you unwell?”

“No. But did you hear a scream?” She walked past Maud and out through the door. The upper floor hallway was quiet, but the scream lingered in her memory.

“I heard nothing, ma’am.” Maud followed her out of the room, frowning. “Are you sure it wasn’t a—”

A muffled wail cut through the stillness.

“Oh!” Maud stopped.

“Indeed!” Alice turned to look at her maid.

“What do you think is amiss, ma’am?” Maud whispered, her dark eyes wide.

“I haven’t the faintest idea.” Her pulse was still racing. “But there’s only one way to find out. We must see at once. Come!”

Ushering Maud ahead of her into the dim corridor, they set off down the passage, past ancestral portraits peering from the panelled walls. The plush Turkish carpet muffled their footsteps as they hurried towards the grand staircase.

Maud slowed down as they approached it and turned around to face Alice. “Er, ma’am. Don’t you think we should wait and call—”

Waking her father, the duke, or calling a footman would be sensible. Yet, she’d feel uneasy remaining in her room while someone might be in need of help.

She squared her shoulders and walked past her maid. “No, Maud. Someone might be in trouble.” She sped up. “Stay by me and do try not to trip over anything—we cannot have both of us tumbling down the stairs in the dark.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Maud mumbled from behind her.

They approached the top of the imposing grand staircase as another piercing scream made Alice start. Her heart leapt into her throat. Gripping the thin brass handrail above the ornately carved and gold-painted balustrade, she peered down at the black-and-white chequered marble-tiled foyer of the Painted Hall.

There, halfway up the stairs, a maid stood stock-still, her hands clamped over her mouth in horror. The girl’s cap was askew, and even from a distance, Alice could see her trembling.

Good heavens, what’s wrong?

Her gaze followed the maid’s terrified stare upwards—beyond the polished banister, to the broad half-landing above. A figure lay crumpled on the shallow platform where the stairs turned, half in shadow.

Her stomach lurched. Someone has fallen! But who…?

She squinted. Why is it so dark? The main staircase was always lit at night, especially during house parties.

She glanced over to the wall. The wall sconce closest to the second-floor landing—the one that usually cast a soft pool of light down the upper flight—was dark. Not just dimmed but completely extinguished. It must have gone out…

She leaned closer, but without the sconce’s steady glow, the landing below was cloaked in gloom. She could just make out the outline of a man—one leg askew, one arm stretched out awkwardly—but his face was hidden, his features swallowed by the dark.

A chill ran down her spine as the awful truth settled over her. The man was…

“Oh, ma’am,” Maud whispered next to her, her voice trembling. “I think... I think he’s…”

“Dead, Maud. Yes, indeed.”