Begins with a bang

Blood Is Blood, the 2018 Barker & Llewelyn mystery by Will Thomas, starts with a bang — quite literally.  The London office where these late-19th century "enquiry agents" work is blown to bits, leaving Cyrus Barker seriously injured. It also leaves Thomas Llewelyn, his assistant, in charge of finding who is responsible for the explosion. And it's just one week before the younger man's planned marriage to Rebecca, a beautiful Jewish widow.

Just then Barker's older brother, Caleb, shows up. He's been in America for a number, working as a Pinkerton detective and now on an assignment in England. The two brothers have never gotten along, but Caleb agrees to help because, after all, blood is blood. Yet Llewelyn can never be sure if Caleb is more help than hinderance, given his habit of disappearing for hours at a time without explanation.

Llewelyn decides the guilty party must be someone with a grudge against Cyrus, and so he investigates all of the likely suspects, including those still in prison. He is assaulted and threatened at every turn, although an attractive young woman who keeps appearing and disappearing seems to be his greatest threat. 

Llewelyn kills a man for the first time, endangering his wedding because he does so in Rebecca's presence. The fact that he may have saved her life does not seem to weigh in his favor.

Will Thomas, an American, keeps these adventures lively and exciting, and Blood Is Blood is certainly no exception.