The queen's men
Masked gunmen ambush Queen Elizabeth as she travels through Waltham forest, peppering her carriage with ball holes before disappearing like wraiths in the night. In the tense hours that follow, while no one knows whether she will live or die, her councillors must make decisions, and roll dice. Some argue for acceptance of the new Queen: Mary of Scotland, while others - John Dee - argue the fight against the darkness must go on, and that he should go across the sea, and into the courts of the Queen's enemies, to do to them what they would do to her. When she survives, Francis Walsingham - responsible for her safety - must explain how such a plot could so nearly succeed: who are the gunmen? How did they know she was coming on that road, that night, and in which carriage she would be travelling? And more importantly, where are they now? Robert Beale, Walsingham's deputy, shaken by the thought of Mary of Scotland inheriting the throne and returning England to Catholicism, stumbles on a solution if such a thing could happen again, but the scheme is lethally fraught with risk, and should it be uncovered, he will be hung, drawn and quartered as a traitor. And in her fever her Majesty dreams of fire, and on waking, comes to believe the only way to protect her country is with Greek Fire, the secret of which died with the Byzantines, but which she commissions her disappointed alchemist and scholar John Dee to rediscover. With the help of one of the Queen's women - Jane Frommond - Walsingham learns the depth and complexity of the plot to kill the Queen; Robert Beale falls violently in love and John Dee reluctantly rediscovers Greek Fire. But their enemy is cunning, and fate fickle. Beale's plot is uncovered, and the Greek Fire stolen, and the Queen's would be assassins evade capture, only to reappear, bent on inflicting a grisly death on Her Majesty. Only one man can stop them. John Dee
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- ISBN: 9781501154751
- Physical Description 416 pages ; 23 cm.
- Publisher [Place of publication not identified] : [publisher not identified], 2021.
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Publishers Weekly Review
The Queen's Men : A Novel
Publishers Weekly
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Set in 1577, Clements's exciting sequel to 2020's The Eyes of the Queen vividly recreates the cloak-and-dagger intrigues of the Elizabethan era. The seriously ill Elizabeth, against the counsel of her advisers who are worried about assassins, insists on returning to her London palace from Hertfordshire. En route, her caravan is accosted by armed men who fire multiple shots into the monarch's carriage before fleeing, mortally wounding one of the occupants. Initially believed to be the queen, the victim proves to be the teenage daughter of a knight who was riding in the royal carriage while the sick queen was being transported in a separate vehicle. The attempt at regicide, along a route whose details were closely guarded, leads Elizabeth to charge Francis Walsingham, "Her Majesty's Principal Private Secretary," with tracking down the killers and identifying the men behind them. At the same time, she orders alchemist John Dee to recreate a legendary weapon, Greek fire, to use against the Spanish. Clements smoothly blends a fast-paced plot with evocative period detail. S.J. Parris fans will be pleased. (Dec.)
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Library Journal Review
The Queen's Men : A Novel
Library Journal
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Clements's second "Agents of the Crown" novel (after The Eyes of the Queen) is a fast-paced, riveting historical thriller narrated by various supporters of Queen Elizabeth I; it asks the question "What if the Good Queen Bess were a spy?" While all of England watches the Great Comet of 1577, the queen falls ill and elects to return to London. When her entourage reaches Waltham Forest, they're attacked by a dozen gunmen who leave her carriage riddled with holes (fortunately, she wasn't inside it at the time). Her spymaster, Francis Walsingham, had no warning--heard no rumors--that there might be an attempt on the queen's life; now he must track down the would-be assassins. All of the queen's supporters, even a lady-in-waiting, get involved in plots to protect her (and to save their own necks if all goes awry). As for Elizabeth, she turns to an old friend, the scientist John Dee, to discover a formula for a weapon to use against her Spanish enemies. In a tense climatic scene during the queen's birthday celebration in 1578, plots and counterplots merge, and the queen once again comes under attack. VERDICT Clements's mystery might be too violent for some, but fans of historical spy novels will be hooked.--Lesa Holstine, Evansville Vanderburgh P.L., IN
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