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In this gothic debut novel, perfect for fans of Tread of Angels and Gail Carriger’s Soulless, Miss Radhika Dhingra, a newly minted lawyer in 19th-century New York, never expected that her first client would be a vampire accused of murder.
Having a resident vampire is just the thing for upper-class New Yorkers–besides being a status symbol, they make excellent butlers or housekeepers. The only thing they require in return is a drop or two of blood and a casket to shut out the dawn’s early light.
Tolerated by society only if they follow a strict set of rules, vampires are seen as “less than”–and as the daughter of immigrants, Radhika knows firsthand how this feels. Accused of murder, her undead client Mr. Evelyn More, knows that the cards are stacked against him.
With the help of a journalist friend and a diminutive detective inspector, Miss Dhingra sets out to prove her client’s innocence and win his freedom. Failure will mean Mr. More’s death, the end of her dreams of becoming a successful attorney, and the loss of the vampire Miss Dhingra has begun to call her friend.
Offering an alternative paranormal history, delightful characters, and insightful social commentary, The Vampire of Kings Street will thrill readers of Deanna Rayburn and Rebecca Roanhorse.
Radhika Dhingra is a young female lawyer of East Indian ancestry in an alternate history version of 1870’s New York City. An alternate New York City in which vampire servants are a status symbol as well as being with no legal rights. When vampire Mr Evelyn More arrives in her office one evening seeking legal aid she is not sure what to think but he is her very first client so she accepts him. The case turns from a simple will to her client being accused of murder, a murder she is not entirely sure he did not commit.
This is a different type of book on several levels. It could be classed alternate history since we have vampires as an accepted part of reality in an otherwise normal version of 1870’s New York City. It read a lot like a cozy mystery so it could be classified as that. We delve a lot in to people’s character, mostly Radhika, Evelyn, and the dead girl Agnes. We also learn about the Frost family for whom Evelyn works. Radhika’s friend Jane, a journalist, and Detective Hitch, a dwarf, are both characters we would love to know more about. In a way, this is sort of depressing, vampires are little more than slaves with no rights and no end in sight to that bondage - Evelyn has been with the Frost family over 200 years. The mystery was satisfactorily solved and the murderer was not on my radar. There is certainly room here for a sequel with Radhika again helping the Detective and I would be happy to read more about all these characters. Recommended ~~ Stephanie L Bannon
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