India Black: A Madam of Espionage Mystery (Madam of Espionage Mystery, #1)

by Carol K. Carr

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When Sir Archibald Latham of the War Office dies from a heart attack while visiting her brothel, Madam India Black is unexpectedly thrust into a deadly game between Russian and British agents who are seeking the military secrets Latham carried.

Blackmailed into recovering the missing documents by the British spy known as French, India finds herself dodging Russian agents-and the attraction she starts to feel for the handsome conspirator.

• ISBN10: 0425238660
• ISBN13: 9780425238660
• Publish Date: 4 January 2011
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: Penguin Putnam Inc
• Imprint: Berkley Publishing Corporation,U.S.
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 304
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9780425238660

Reviews

[MurderByDeath]

Excellent first novel. I was amused and enthused from the first chapter. The book is categorised as an "historical mystery" but there really isn't much mystery involved. A lot of the story reads a bit like keystone cops play spy, but truly, I found the book entertaining and the characters interesting enough for me to care what happened to them. I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the series.

[elysium]

India Black is owner of a brothel named Lotus House and her life is disrupted when a regular customer is found dead in her establishment. Thinking that the death will be bad for business and she decides to dispose the body. She gets help from a street kid named Vincent but they are caught by an English spy named French. India learns that the dead was high-ranking government official and was carrying important papers. Goverment thinks she will be useful to getting the papers back so India and French starts hunting down the Russians.

This was so much fun and loved this so much! Despite the heroine being a brothel owner there is no sex scenes and very little time is spent in there anyway. I’m not usually huge fan of first person narrative but it worked well on here and loved seeing what she thinks. India is funny and strong woman who has blunt honesty, is down to earth and isn’t ashamed of who she is.

Some of the politics went over my head but since it doesn’t concern India that closely it didn’t really matter. There isn’t much background being told so both India and French stays a little mystery and I would have loved to learn more about French.

This was such amazing read and laughed out loud many times! Great debut from Carr!