Note: Thank you to NetGalley, Kensington Publishing, and author Andrea Penrose for the advanced reader copy of this book. This review will also be posted on NetGalley. What follows is my unbiased review of the book.

Murder at King’s Crossing is the eighth book in author Andrea Penrose’s Wrexford and Sloane series. Set in Regency England, it provides quite a different look at society than the romances often set during this time. Instead of focusing on romance and “making a good match,” this series focuses more on the scientific discoveries of the time among some of the most wealthy and intelligent in society.

With it being the eighth book, I think it might be a little harder to pick up the series here. I began reading the series with the sixth book, then went back and read what I’d missed. I understood what was going on, but I appreciated the story and the characters much more knowing the background presented in previous novels.

Lord Wrexford and Charlotte are hosting the nuptials of their closest friends, Kit Sheffield and Cordelia Mansfield, at the Lord’s country estate. The day before the wedding, a terrible storm blows through. The wedding still goes off as planned, although there are some people who couldn’t make it. However, while they are celebrating, the authorities arrive to question Kit and Cordelia. It seems a man was found murdered at the King’s Crossing Bridge with the only clue to his identity being an invitation to the wedding.

At first, they believe it might be Cordelia’s cousin, Oliver, who was invited to the wedding but never made it. Later, the body is identified as Jasper Milton, who was also a friend of Cordelia’s. The two men were involved in the Revolutions-Per-Minute Society, which was focused on improving transportation throughout England. This could open up the world for those at the bottom of Society, as there would be a greater ability to travel further for work. Jasper apparently had some revolutionary bridge design that many people would like to get their hands on, and Oliver is still missing. Cordelia decides to postpone their honeymoon until her cousin can be found and the mystery is solved.

One of the things I enjoyed so much about this book was that it pointed out how something we take for granted nowadays was such an obstacle to overcome in the past. That would be the ability to travel for work. At a time before trains were widespread, people had to work near where they lived, which limited what was available to them. Even here, trains are starting to have promise, but there is a struggle to be able to build bridges to accommodate them. We take it for granted to be able to commute to a job, but at this time it was not an option for many people.

The characters in the world Penrose has created have expanded, and it can be hard to understand where they fit in if you’re picking up the series here. “Peregrine” first appeared in the sixth book in the series, and here finds himself failing to fit in at Eton and returns to the care of Charlotte and Wrexford. He has some different insights that help them along with the mystery at hand. Penrose does give a brief background to this character, so it might not be quite that difficult, but at this point in the series, there are many characters who have varying stories that are worth knowing.

The science here is calculus and engineering. Cordelia and Charlotte use the fact that women are so easily dismissed in this era to enable them to gain the information needed to figure out what is going on. Cordelia knows many of the members of the Revolutions-Per-Minute Society from her own secret forays into higher education. Yet, even then, they don’t see her as a real threat.

I did not figure out the mystery until the end. Actually, I had zero idea who it was. There were a few times I thought I might have a handle on who the murderer was and where the missing designs might be, but in the end, I was wrong on all accounts. I don’t know that there was enough information ahead of time to figure it out, but I did enjoy following the story until all was revealed.

Charlotte is having a bit of a crisis, as well. Until she and Wrexford were married, she relied on her alter-ego, satirical artist A.J. Quill, to make ends meet. Now, she continues to do it as a way of bringing issues impacting those who don’t have a voice in society into the limelight. She frets that she has become too soft now as Lady Wrexford to have the same impact she used to, even though her husband does not limit her exploits. Their two wards, orphans who Charlotte took under her wing and who were absorbed into the family when they married, have a bit more to do here than in the previous book. It’s nice to see the boys growing older, as well as the impact education can have on the populace. There’s some great growth all around here among the ongoing characters.

I felt Murder at King’s Crossing was a strong entry in this series. Penrose gives a lot of information in her afterword about the historical context and how much is real versus what she invented for the story. It’s really fascinating to see the scientific advances being made and the consequences they would have. I never really thought about transportation being intrinsic to the creation of the middle class before, but it’s presented here in an easy-to-understand way, if the math went over my head (I could never grasp calculus no matter how hard I tried.) The characters continue to grow with no real surprises. If you like historical fiction but want something more than just romance, I think you’ll really enjoy this series and this book.

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