Earlyfate - Nat Reeve

Earlyfate by Nat Reeve / ISBN 9781917008068 / 322-page paperback with flaps published in 2024 by Cipher Press *** 'The whole Division will sneer when they read this, I know it. But how, pray tell, was I to discern just how wrong it would go?' Pip Property is no stranger to disaster. Typically, they've got a plan, but now Dallyangle's favourite dandy & part-time criminal is locked in the morgue of the crime-fighting Division gone rogue, accused of far more crimes than they've actually committed, with (at least) two bucolic burglars out to strangle them with their own cravat. Their lover - the semi-feral Welsh heiress Rosamond Nettleblack - has disappeared into dangerous hands. Enlisting the Division to save Rosamond might be Pip's only hope, but the cravat designer and the chaotic vigilantes have never seen eye to eye. The Division is looking to prove themselves to a potential new patron - and trusting schemers like Pip is a risk the detectives don't want to take. Armed only with a borrowed notebook, threadbare charm, suits without cravat pins and a swordstick everyone keeps confiscating, Pip must get the Division on-side, convince the Division that faith is a thing they can still have, and unravel the truth behind Rosamond's disappearance before it's too late. Nat Reeve is a writer and researcher. They're currently working towards a PhD in Victorian art, literature and queerness at Royal Holloway, University of London. In academical guise, they mostly write about Elizabeth Siddal causing havoc with medieval objects, or horrible geese invading Pre-Raphaelite artworks. They have also been known to edit, perform in and direct Victorian plays and operas, to the sideburn-stricken bafflement of their audiences. Nettleblack is their first novel.