1592. Robert Carey, eighth son of Lord Hunsdon, has – to his servants' dismay – abandoned Queen Elizabeth I's court and is heading north to take up the post of Deputy Warden of the English West March, a lawless badlands, peopled by cattle-rustlers, horse-thieves, arsonists, kidnappers and murderers created by centuries of Anglo-Scottish conflict. Carey, in his lace-collared, pearl-sashed courtly finery, will be expected to bring order to this bloody flux. Plunging readers straight into the raucous world of late sixteenth-century border reivers and unfettered Elizabethan intrigue, Guns in the North, the first chronicle of Sir Robert Carey's adventures, collecting the novels A Famine of Horses, A Season of Knives and A Surfeit of Guns under one volume. A Famine of Horses © 1994. A Season of Knives © 1995. A Surfeit of Guns © 1996.

Edinburgh, 1593. The new year begins. Sir Robert Carey has just foiled a double plot against King James. He rides for Leith hunting the would-be assassin now identified as Joachim Hochstetter, also known as Jonathan Hepburn. Has he taken ship for the Continent, or ridden nearly 130 miles south and west into England? There at Keswick, his family, originally from Augsburg, runs a mining operation that pays a royalty to Queen Elizabeth in gold. It's ruled by the widow Radagunda Hochstetter, his mother. Sir Robert's other problem? His dour, difficult, and now treasonous henchman, Sergeant Henry Dodd, has disappeared somewhere on the snowy moors. Why can't anyone find Dodd's body? Before going after Hochstetter, Carey must escort Dodd's widow back to her home at Gilsland. It's a complex operation involving a cart, Widow Ridley and Skinabake Armstrong. That's the man who sold Janet Dodd to Wee Colin, the Elliot headman, on her way to Edinburgh before Dodd...

Carlisle, 1592. Robert Carey abandoned the lace-collared finery of Queen Elizabeth I's court for the lawless badlands between the kingdoms of England and Scotland. He's found life among the border's cattle-rustlers, horse-thieves, arsonists, kidnappers and murderers curiously engaging. But now, alas, he's been summoned back to London. Before he can return to his new home in the North, Carey must find his missing brother, clear the family name, navigate a feud between playwrights, identify a badly decomposed body washed up on the Queen's privy steps, and investigate a murder some thirty years past... Plunging readers straight into the racous world of late sixteenth-century border reivers and unfettered Elizabethan intrigue, Knives in the South is the second chronicle of Sir Robert Carey's adventures, collecting the novels A Plague of Angels, A Murder of Crows and An Air of Treason under one volume....

"It’s September 1592, and the redoubtable Sergeant Dodd is still in London with dashing courtier Sir Robert Carey, dealing with the fall-out from their earlier adventures. Carey urgently needs to get back to Carlisle where he is the Deputy Warden; the raiding season is about to begin. However, there are complications. His powerful father, Henry, Lord Hunsdon (son of the other Boleyn girl, Mary, and her paramour, young Henry VIII) wants him to solve the mystery of a badly decomposed corpse that has washed up from the Thames on Her Majesty’s privy steps. Meanwhile, although he hates London, Sergeant Dodd has decided that he will not go north until he has taken suitable revenge for his mistreatment by the Queen’s Vice Chamberlain, Thomas Heneage. Carey’s father wants him to sue, but none of the lawyers in London will take the brief against such a dangerous courtier. Then a mysterious young lawyer with a pock-marked face eagerly offers to help Dodd. Nobody knows who that balding young would-be poet and lover William Shakespeare might be working for. And then, just as Carey is resigning himself to the delay, the one person he really does not want to see again arrives in London to stir up everything. "From Publishers WeeklySet in 1592, Chisholm's fifth Sir Robert Carey mystery (after 2000's A Plague of Angels) includes a couple of potentially interesting supporting characters, Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare, but the playwrights come across as mere caricatures. Not much more developed are the two leads—Carey, the son of Anne Boleyn's sister, Mary, and thus cousin to Queen Elizabeth, and his sidekick, Sergeant Dodd, whose heavy dialect (whit can ye dae to show us ye're no' one o' his kinship come tae trap us in ambush?) can be tough to follow. Carey and Dodd seek legal representation to bring a case of unlawful imprisonment against the queen's vice chamberlain, look into the identity of an unclaimed corpse found in the Thames, and probe some shady land deals in Cornwall. Unfortunately, the multiple story lines fail to gel, and the plot drags for long stretches. Fans of Elizabethan historicals would do better with Rory Clements's Martyr (2009). (June) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From BooklistChisholm’s fifth mystery starring Sir Robert Carey, deputy warren of the English West Marsh, is brimming with Elizabethan atmosphere and historical detail. This episode is more about Carey’s Sergeant Dodd, who seeks revenge for a mistreatment by the queen’s vice chamberlain, Thomas Henage, than it is about Carey himself. Dodd and Carey are in London wrapping up details from their earlier adventures and anxious to return to Carlisle, where the raiding season is about to begin. Carey’s father suggests that Dodd sue Henage, but no lawyer in London will take on such a powerful man. When a mysterious young lawyer appears and agrees to take the case, Carey and Dodd are afraid that he is a spy. Meanwhile, the balding poet William Shakespeare appears, and no one is sure what he is doing or for whom he is working. This very busy plot will delight historical fans who enjoy local color. Recommend Chisholm’s series to fans of Karen Harper and Simon Hawke. --Barbara Bibel

This time out, it's Sir Robert Carey's unhappily married love, Elizabeth, who solves a murder steeped in political intrigue. Lady Elizabeth Widdrington is buying two horses that had most likely been stolen in Scotland when her friend Poppy Burn arrives in a terrible state. Far gone in pregnancy, the hysterical Poppy reveals that her husband, James, a minister over the Scottish border in Wendron, was murdered by two strangers who also raped her. Despite the fact that Elizabeth knows her cruel and indifferent husband, Sir Henry, will be furious, she crosses the border herself, accompanied by young Henry and several Widdrington cousins, to see James properly buried. At Poppy's house she finds the strong-willed dowager Lady Hume of Norland, who's perhaps a little mad, doing all in her power to keep her beloved grandson, Hughie, out of the hands of Lord Spynie, the homosexual favorite of King James VI of Scotland. Although the border country is rife with stealing, murder, and clan...

After his hair-raising adventures in London, Sir Robert Carey has finally tracked down Queen Elizabeth, who is about to make a state visit to Oxford. But instead of giving the Courtier his much-needed warrant and fee for being Deputy Warden of the West March with Scotland, Her Majesty orders him to investigate the most dangerous cold case of her reign—the mysterious 1560 death of Amy Dudley(née Robsart), unloved wife of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester.Some thirty years back, the late Dudley was Elizabeth’s favorite suitor and potential husband. Amy died at Cumnor Place, close at hand. The Queen has since been one of the most obvious suspects in arranging Amy’s murder. This makes Carey deeply uneasy with his sleuthing role. He’s further uneasy that his father, Elizabeth’s cousin from the wrong side of the blanket, is clearly involved. Then someone manages to poison Carey with belladonna, which temporarily blinds him. Worse still, Sergeant Dodd, the man most often guarding Carey’s back, has disappeared on the road from London.As the Queen’s scandalous past collides with her magnificent State entrance into Oxford, can Carey rally in time to find both Dodd and the true murderer of Amy Robsart?   **

It's late August, 1592.Sir Robert Carey, cousin to Queen Elizabeth from the wrong side of Henry VIII's blanket, remains at his post on the Borders at Carlisle. He has at last been confirmed by his monarch as Deputy Warden, is still deeply in love with Lady Elizabeth Widdrington while despising her elderly, abusive husband (will the man never die?). And he remains estranged from his dour but lethal henchman, Henry Dodd, Land-Sergeant of Gilsland, who is currently serving as one of the sergeants of the Carlisle Castle guard. Dodd can't forgive Carey for taking the high road at the conclusion of the incident at Dick of Dryhope's tower, when Sir Robert called out the Carlisle garrison, but "honourably and skillfully avoided the bloody-pitched battle" that seemed inevitable. Dodd is old-school and would have preferred to exterminate as many under Wee Colin Elliott, and also Grahams, as he could. Not for him, but for peace to the Debatable Land.Sir Robert Cecil, Privy Councillor to...