A Curious Beginning by Deanna Raybourn
What's It About?
Deanna Raybourn’s lively mystery unravels much like the plot of a fairy tale by one of the brothers Grimm, complete with an orphaned heroine, a traveling circus, a giant, conjoined twins and a prince.In A Curious Beginning (Berkley), we’re introduced to Veronica Speedwell, lepidopterist, world traveler and dedicated hedonist. She has plans for an adventure on her own, but she keeps getting spirited away by mysterious men whose job, they say, is to keep her safe.
But safe from what? Or whom? Veronica stumbles from hideout to hideout, finally joining forces with Stoker, a handsome taxidermist who, when she meets him, is in the process of stretching the hide of an elephant over an enormous steel skeleton. Incredibly, things get stranger from there.
When her latest supposed benefactor turns up dead, Veronica and Stoker run off and join the circus, literally. Here we learn about another of Stoker’s talents: he’s a knife-thrower — you know, the kind that throws knives that narrowly miss the limbs of a pretty girl who is fastened to a target. In this case, Veronica. He can also handle a whip, dress a wound and successfully hunt down tigers.
They make an unlikely pair, crackling with short tempers and competition. They dance around their sexual attraction and exchange quips, insults and repartee while digging around for clues to the identity of the murderer and his whereabouts. Their journey is cluttered with antiquities and collections of artwork and taxidermy. It’s a labyrinth, but their lives are in danger.
Poor Veronica. She’s robbed, stabbed, thrown overboard, betrayed, weakened by malaria and blinded by headaches; but she maintains her composure and talent for sarcasm, facing all her misadventures armed with a butterfly net and a hatpin.
Raybourn writes in the flowery style of a Victorian novelist, dropping an occasional word that may send readers to the dictionary: fustian, orchidaceous, pangolin. She shows an admirable familiarity with Greek mythology, Keats, Plutarch, Spanish brandy and, of course, butterflies.
Although many threads are neatly tied up at the end of the story, the title of the book is eventually shown to be prescient. Mr. Stoker and Ms. Speedwell are clearly not done. They have a museum collection to catalog, and a revelation of truth that needs to be dealt with. “Burn it, publish it, throw it in the Thames,” says Stoker, “…[but] the decision must be yours and no one else’s.”
Knowing Veronica Speedwell, it won’t be dull.
A Curious Beginning is now available for purchase.
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