"Ireland 1923. Reverend Mother Aquinas is buying buttered eggs in the Cork city market at the very moment when the city engineer, James Doyle, is assassinated. Although no one saw the actual killing, a young reporter named Sam O'Mahony is found standing close to the body, a pistol in his hand, and is arrested and charged. Following a desperate appeal from Sam's mother, convinced of her son's innocence, the Reverend Mother investigates -- and, in this...

The Reverend Mother receives a decidedly gruesome gift in this compelling Irish historical mystery. Ireland. 1925. Like all who seek charitable contributions, Reverend Mother Aquinas is used to being gifted some fairly dubious items. But nothing like this. On opening the evil-smelling trunk, labelled 'old books', the Reverend Mother is horrified to discover it contains the dead body of one of Cork's richest merchants, wrapped in decomposing animal...

Money is the root of all evil, according to the Reverend Mother — but is it the motive for her cousin's murder? Wealthy widow Charlotte Hendrick had always promised that her riches would be divided equally between her seven closest relatives when she died. Now she has changed her mind and summoned her nearest and dearest, including her cousin, the Reverend Mother, to her substantial home on Bachelor's Quay to inform them of her decision. As Mrs....