num_pages: 581
description: It is 1540, and Matthew Shardlake, the lawyer renowned as "the sharpest hunchback in the courts of England," is pressed to help a friend's young niece who is charged with murder. Despite threats of torture and death by the rack, the girl is inexplicably silent. Shardlake is about to lose her case when he is suddenly granted a reprieveone that will ensnare him in the dangerous schemes of Thomas Cromwell, Henry VIII's feared vicar-general.  In exchange for two more weeks to investigate the murder, Shardlake accepts Cromwell's dangerous assignment to find a lost cache of "dark fire," a legendary weapon of mass destruction. Cromwell, out of favor since Henry's disastrous marriage to Anne of Cleves, is relying on Shardlake to save his position at court, which is rife with treasonous conspiracies. With its wonderful attention to period detail and its brilliant handling of suspense, Dark Fire is sure to win comparisons with Margaret George's Mary Queen of Scotland and the Isles and captivate readers of Philippa Gregory and David Liss.
language: English
title: Dark Fire
titlecomplete: Dark Fire (Matthew Shardlake, #2)
characters: Guy Malton, Jack Barak, Thomas Howard, Richard Riche, Thomas Cromwell, Matthew Shardlake
genres: Mystery, Fiction, Tudor Period, Mystery Thriller, Thriller, Historical Fiction, Crime, Historical, Historical Mystery, British Literature
ratings_count: 27333
places: London, England, United Kingdom
series: Matthew Shardlake
awards: awardedAt: 1104566400000
name: CWA Ellis Peters Historical Award
publisher: Pan Books