THE GODLESS

A serial killer strikes London in 1381.

Someone has been brutally murdering prostitutes, leaving them
with their throats cut, naked save for some outlandish red wigs. It’s clearly a
case for Athelstan, the Dominican parish priest who, together with his friend Sir
John Cranston, Lord High Coroner of London, has solved many a perplexing crime
(The Mansions of Murder, 2018, etc.)—even though they must also look
into the mysterious case of the royal ship The Knave of Hearts, loaded
with gunpowder and gold as it left on a trip to France, which blew up on the
Thames, leaving no survivors. London is rife with rumors about the Oriflamme,
whose name has not been spoken in almost 20 years. Back when England’s armies
were ravaging Normandy earlier in the Hundred Years’ War, a man of that name
was leader of a gang using the war barge Le Sans Dieu, or “The
Godless,” as a base for killing, plundering, and torturing women who were left
dead or dying, wearing red wigs like the one the Oriflamme himself wore along
with a white mask and a woman’s dress. Because one of the lost was a woman of
high birth, the French are now in London seeking revenge. Many who served in
France, enriched by the plunder, now lead respectable lives, but they’re still
haunted by the sins of the past. These include members of Athelstan’s parish
like Godbless, who turns up dead in a building that appears to be locked from
inside. Athelstan and Cranston must tap all their many sources to find clues to
the Oriflamme’s identity as he continues to kill at will.

The mystery this time takes second place to some unpleasant historical
truths: gruesome portraits of murder in a London so squalid it may make your
hair stand on end.