The Silver Collar

The next rip-roaring thriller from Antonia Hodgson, featuring Thomas Hawkins

The Englishmen of early-Georgian London were very proud of their liberty - but it was often bought at the cost of others'' freedom. Wives owned nothing on their own - everything belonged to their husbands. And much of the wealth of the booming city was built by slaves. Slavery was illegal in Britain - but the vastly lucrative triangular trade between her great port cities, the West coast of Africa and the West Indies was decidedly not and neither was the buying and selling of the commodities that they produced, such as sugar and cotton.

Tom and Kitty should be happy. Kitty''s shop is a successful, even if shady, concern and Tom, having escaped the hangman''s noose, is something of a celebrity in the taverns and bagnios of Covent Garden. Then someone tries to murder Tom. This is no mugging, but an organized attack and investigation leads to a fine house in Jermyn Street and the mysterious Lady Vanhook.

Now things spiral from bad to worse. Vanhook is none other than Kitty''s mother - the mother who tried to sell her as a prostitute and who Kitty thought was dead. She has been in the West Indies, the mistress of a plantation, and now that her husband has died, she has returned - for revenge upon Kitty and to claim every penny of her inheritance.

A pulsating narrative of kidnap, danger, betrayal and redemption, The Silver Collar is also a powerful love story and a stark portrait of the seething violence and corruption behind the elegant facade of Georgian England.

Praise for Antonia Hodgson

''In a tale that more than matches its predecessors for pace and atmosphere, Hawkins is forced into confrontation with a psychopathic killer . . . hugely enjoyable'' - The Sunday Times

''One of the most impressive practitioners of the historical crime genre'' - Independent