Kathryn Swinbrooke Mysteries

The Kathryn Swinbrooke Mysteries follow a physician and apothecary working in Canterbury during the unsettled Yorkist years after the Wars of the Roses. Kathryn’s medical knowledge allows her to distinguish natural death from poisoning, injury and deliberate deception, while her independence brings her into investigations involving civic officials, merchants, religious houses and agents of the crown.

The cases range from murdered pilgrims and disputed relics to blackmail, supposed miracles and secrets carried home from the fall of Constantinople. Canterbury’s shrines, guilds and crowded streets provide the recurring setting, but the consequences of national conflict remain close. Kathryn’s partnership with Colum Murtagh joins forensic observation to political enquiry in a period when old Lancastrian loyalties and new Yorkist authority continue to divide households.