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Unnatural Vice cover

An Unnatural Vice: out now, with more art!

An Unnatural Vice, book 2 in my Sins of the Cities sequence, hits the ether today. unnatural vice

Sins of the Cities is my take on the Victorian sensation novel. There’s murder, family secrets, disputed inheritance, peculiar lines of work, ongoing love stories, and fog. Lots of fog.

In fact, An Unnatural Vice is set during a real fog which was one of the worst of the 19th century. And I don’t just mean it was a bit murky out. The combination of pollution from home fires and factory chimneys and the murky atmosphere of a low-lying city in a river valley meant the air basically curdled. The 1873 fog lasted for a full week, during which time the Smithfield Cattle Show was held: more than 50 prize cows died of suffocation. Theatres had to be closed because nobody could see the stage. People died of respiration problems, in their hundreds, and also because they walked into ditches and the river.

A reporter wrote of a different and less severe London fog:

Night appears to be pressing close against the window-panes at noon-day… Traffic is not interrupted, although daylight is completely extinguished–so long as the pall remains above the housetops. When it descends to the surface of the ground, the discreet remain indoors; belated pedestrians are conducted home by link-boys […]; cabmen lead their horses, and vehicles moving at a snail’s pace frequently come to grief; the driver of the tram-car is unable to see his horses, and the conductor is hardly able to distinguish the hand that passes the fare.

To reiterate: that fog she’s describing is less bad than the 1873 one I use in An Unnatural Vice.

They called them pea-soupers for a reason. The air was thick; the fog would create banks in side streets and enclosed areas. You could not see to cross the road; lifelong Londoners would be hopelessly lost in their own neighbourhood. Now imagine you’re dodging a murderer…

An Unnatural Vice is set in that fog, and stars journalist Nathaniel Roy and fraudulent spiritualist Justin Lazarus, as they try to see their way clear in every sense. Nathaniel is a privileged moral crusader still mourning his long-dead lover; Justin is a gutter-bred scam artist who pretends to contact the dead for a living. It goes as well as you might expect…

“Spirits, if you wish to share your names now, give us that gift. Mark them where we may see them, if we are worthy to be told. Let us see now.” Lazarus closed his eyes, tilting his head back to expose his throat, a priestly action that had a wholly secular effect on Nathaniel.

Justin Lazarus was without question a disgraceful fraud, but as his lips moved in silent prayer, Nathaniel could not help the thought that he looked like a glorious fuck. The bad kind, of course; the kind that left a man feeling dirty and ashamed and degraded in his own eyes. The kind Nathaniel had never had in practice, and wouldn’t have admitted to imagining, but could see all too clearly. Bending the medium over his own table, holding him down. You want the furniture to move, Mr. Lazarus? That can be arranged.

All About Romance gave it a grade A/Desert Isle Keeper review, saying “I thought the first book in the Sins of the Cities trilogy was terrific, but this one is even better.  …  Their mutual enmity and lust are palpable, and the evolution of their relationship – from bitter enemies to devoted lovers – is gripping and romantic.”

I hope you enjoy it!

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The Sins of the Cities trilogy has an ongoing series plot (think of it as a sort of inside-out three-decker Victorian novel), so while you can read this one alone if you must, it’ll make more sense read after An Unseen Attraction. Book 3, An Unsuitable Heir, is out in October.

And to celebrate, let’s have some Mila May art…here’s Nathaniel, Justin, and Justin’s housemaid Sukey. The complete set of cards dealt so far can be seen here.) Enjoy!

CARD_NATHANIEL(2.25 x 3.5)CARD_SUKEY(2.25 x 3.5)CARD_JUSTIN(2.25 x 3.5)

Sins of the Cities: deal them in…

In which I introduce my new Victorian Sensation queer romance trilogy, with FAQs and illustrations. (Art by the ubertalented Mila May.)

What do you mean, Victorian Sensation?

I’m glad you asked me that. The Victorians were far from being the repressed nothing-on-Sunday bores of popular imagination. The snobs and the moralisers are always with us, but if you look at what people were actually up to–books, plays, newspapers–they loved scandal, drama, melodrama, murder, sex, mysteries, booze, romance, sentiment, off-colour jokes, raucous music hall, theatrical spectacle, and pretty much everything that is fun.

Victorian Sensation was basically what we now call genre fiction, on crack. Sex! Murder! Secrets in high places! Slumming! Mysterious strangers! Femmes fatales! Aristocratic families brought low! Ludicrously implausible coincidences! Everything happening in three volumes! If you fancy a read, Wilkie Collins and Mary Elizabeth Braddon were the acknowledged rulers of the genre. I particularly like Lady Audley’s Secret with its antiheroine running rings round the posh boys; Armadale is distinguished by a magnificent villain continually off her face on drugs, and no fewer than four characters called Allan Armadale, one of whom very reasonably calls himself Ozias Midwinter to avoid attention.

What I’m getting at is, this is not going to be drawing-room tea parties, and nobody is putting frills on their piano legs.

Go on, then, tell me about it.

The Sins of the Cities trilogy (obviously it’s a trilogy; everything Victorian happens in three volumes by law) is set in London, winter 1873, a year distinguished by one of the worst fogs ever recorded.  We begin with An Unseen Attraction, in which we meet Clem Talleyfer, an unassuming lodging-house keeper with a lovely sweet pet cat.

Clem’s busy running his house, managing the lodgers, getting by, and maybe just slightly pining after his newest lodger: the taxidermist next door, Rowley Green. Meet Rowley.

Just two gentle, reserved, quiet men getting along. Two of the nicest characters I think I’ve ever written, actually. What could possibly go wrong?

Yeah, right, KJ. We’ve met you.

OK, so it’s possible things may take a very slight turn for the murdery. But just a bit.

You’re not fooling anyone but yourself.

Fine. Sex! Murder! Secrets in high places! Slumming! Mysterious strangers! Femmes fatales! Aristocratic families brought low! Ludicrously implausible coincidences! Everything happening in three volumes!

Ah yes. Three volumes?

Each book is a standalone romance featuring a separate couple, and each has a proper ending. But there’s also an overarching story running across all three books–so don’t expect all the loose ends to be tied up till book 3. They all feature the same cast of characters, many of whom are linked because they go to the Jack and Knave, a discreet and unassuming pub for a particular clientele. Would you care to meet some of the Jack and Knave’s regulars?

Go on, then.

We play the Diamonds in book 2, An Unnatural Vice. For now, meet Nathaniel, lawyer turned journalist, wealthy archbishop’s son, and upstanding member of society. Unfortunately, let’s just say, his love interest is very much a knave. (Nathaniel is kind of screwed.)

And here’s the Jack of Spades: private enquiry agent Mark Braglewicz. A practical man. His King of Spades…well, you’ll find out in due course. I couldn’t give everything away now, could I?

And that, for now, is where matters stand. A quiet taxidermist, a gentle-hearted lodging-house keeper, and his friends from the pub…oh, and the Queen of Hearts. Did I mention the Queen of Hearts?

Well, go on, then, who’s she?

That, my friend, would be telling.

The hands are dealt, the cards are on the table. Let the games begin.

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An Unseen Attraction will be hitting the e-shelves on 21 February at all the usual places. (This post is a bit in advance but I’m going on holiday tomorrow and will be incommunicado for a week at least. I say at least because we’re going to the Yorkshire moors, so the chances of being eaten by a giant spectral hound are like 50/50 tbh.)