Oh, I’ve been waiting for Tom Walsingham to tackle the Babington Plot forever… And now, here we are! Only, it all starts most frustratingly for poor Tom…

It’s the sweltering days of the summer of 1586, and all our hero can do is to sit impatiently in Sir Francis’s house in Seething Lane, overseeing the nerve-wracking work of keeping tabs on Anthony Babington’s bunch of well-born plotters. They mean to murder Queen Elizabeth, and put the captive Mary Stuart on the throne… And they’re all under careful surveillance, each word they speak reported to Seething Lane. It should be simple, really – just a matter of waiting for the good moment to have them all seized and thrown in the Tower…

But nothing is ever easy in Tom’s world: the plot can’t be stopped until Sir Francis has conclusive proof that Mary Stuart is involved – and the Scots Queen, always one to run headlong into ruinous actions, is being cautious for once!  As the days pass, and tempers fray, what if Babington should decide to act without Mary’s explicit blessing?

But then one of Tom’s couriers goes missing, and the waiting game is disrupted: have the plotters captured Isaac Finch? Do they know they’re under surveillance? Are they putting their plan in execution no matter what…?

Then again, as soon as Tom begins to investigate, it becomes clear that plenty of people had reason to wish harm to the unpleasant Finch – including some of his colleague. Perhaps the man’s disappearance has nothing to do with Babington; perhaps it’s all the difference between peace and disaster…

Can Tom unravel the mystery before it’s too late – for them all, for Queen Elizabeth, for England? Follow him as he strives to undo… A Deadly Complot! To find out… well, you can’t read A Deadly Complot yet – but you can preorder it on Amazon here.