The Maiden's Court: Mailbox Monday #135

Welcome to another Monday! I just realized that Monday’s just might not be so bad when I can consider all the wonderful books I got the week before. Something to make up for starting up the work week again.

This week I again picked up three books and again all in different book formats.

As an audiobook I received Hour of Peril by Daniel Stashower from the publisher via the Audiobook Jukebox Solid Gold Reviewer program. This is a NF about the first assassination plot against Lincoln on his way to the White House after being elected. I was interested in this one because part of this story was introduced to me in The Lincoln Conspiracy by Timothy O’Brien last year and the fact that this NF is supposed to read like a thriller.

Daniel Stashower, the two-time Edgar award–winning author of The Beautiful Cigar Girl, uncovers the riveting true story of the “Baltimore Plot,” an audacious conspiracy to assassinate Abraham Lincoln on the eve of the Civil War in THE HOUR OF PERIL.

In February of 1861, just days before he assumed the presidency, Abraham Lincoln faced a “clear and fully-matured” threat of assassination as he traveled by train from Springfield to Washington for his inauguration. Over a period of thirteen days the legendary detective Allan Pinkerton worked feverishly to detect and thwart the plot, assisted by a captivating young widow named Kate Warne, America’s first female private eye.

As Lincoln’s train rolled inexorably toward “the seat of danger,” Pinkerton struggled to unravel the ever-changing details of the murder plot, even as he contended with the intractability of Lincoln and his advisors, who refused to believe that the danger was real. With time running out Pinkerton took a desperate gamble, staking Lincoln’s life—and the future of the nation—on a “perilous feint” that seemed to offer the only chance that Lincoln would survive to become president. Shrouded in secrecy—and, later, mired in controversy—the story of the “Baltimore Plot” is one of the great untold tales of the Civil War era, and Stashower has crafted this spellbinding historical narrative with the pace and urgency of a race-against-the-clock thriller.

As an e-book I received City of Lights by Melika Lux as a part of the Historical Fiction Virtual Book Tour.

What would you risk for the love of a stranger?

Ilyse Charpentier, a beautiful young chanteuse, is the diva of the 1894 Parisian cabaret scene by night and the unwilling obsession of her patron, Count Sergei Rakmanovich, at every other waking moment.

Though it has always been her secret desire, Ilyse's life as "La Petite Coquette" of the Paris stage has turned out to be anything but the glamorous existence she had dreamt of as a girl. As a young woman, Ilyse has already suffered tragedy and become estranged from her beloved brother, Maurice, who blames her for allowing the Count to drive them apart.

Unhappy and alone, Ilyse forces herself to banish all thoughts of independence until the night Ian McCarthy waltzes into her life. Immediately taken with the bold, young, British expatriate, Ilyse knows it is time to choose: will she break free and follow her heart or will she remain a slave to her patron’s jealous wrath for the rest of her life?

And as a traditional print paperback, I received Through a Dusty Window by Delancy Stewart from the publisher as a part of the Historical Fiction Virtual Book Tours.

New York City is a place full of whispers and ghosts. It is impossible to walk the sidewalks there without considering the lives and paths of those who walked them before; those who left their imprints – visible and hidden – on everything that makes up the city today. Through a Dusty Window is a collection of ten short stories spanning a century between 1910 and 2001, all of which take place in the same Upper West Side brownstone apartment. Through each vignette, readers are given perspective on historical events that deeply influenced the city, filtered and understood – or misunderstood – through the eyes of Stewart’s characters. From Prohibition to World War II; the Vietnam-era Summer of Sam killings to John Lennon’s murder – Stewart’s stories give modern day explorers a chance to see the city as it was, and to answer the question: who was here before me?

What wonderful books did you get this week?

Mailbox Monday is on a monthly blog tour and for the month of February it is being hosted by Audra at Unabridged Chick.