title: The Dons and Mr Dickens: The Strange Case of the Oxford Christmas Plot
author:  William J. Palmer 
description: In this historical mystery "lite," Wilkie Collins and his mentor, Charles Dickens, aided by Charles Dodgson, investigate the murder of one of Dodgson's fellow Oxford dons. As in other novels in this series (The Detective and Mr. Dickens, etc.), Dickens's mistress, the actress Ellen Ternan, plays a key roleDhere disguised as a barmaid at an Oxford pub, where she's planted in hopes she'll overhear members of the odd circle of dons that included the victim reveal some clue to his murder. Our heroes come to realize that these dons are involved in a neo-Gunpowder Plot, only possibly harmless, timed for Queen Victoria's annual Oxford visit. The author, a Dickens scholar, keeps the reader guessing the motives and the identity of the group's ringleader, while the jealous agonies that Dickens goes through as Ellen plays her often saucy part account for much of the fun in this "secret Victorian journal." Fun of a different sort is spotting the anachronisms. The year is 1853, yet Dodgson in a major scene uses "flash powder" to take a picture in the dark, decades before flash photography. Most egregious, however, is Mycroft Holmes, in a cameo role as a government agent, speaking of his "eccentric younger brother" the year before the great detective's birth. Some readers won't notice or care, but for the more literate, the prime audience for this type of mystery, such lapses only undermine the spell. An attractive period dust jacket is a plus. <br />Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
zlib_text: 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  THEIR EVIL WAYS
  
  
  
  
  
  John Wainwright
  
  
  ## ONE
  
  
  
  
  
  It was a nice night. Unseasonal, in that it was uncommonly _seasonal_ ;
  Monday, December 14th, a mere nine shopping days to Christmas, and already the
  snow and ice had arrived with the obvious intention of making this particular
  Yuletide deep and crisp and even in true Dickensian tradition. Groups of kids
  trudged the pavements, stopped at doors, gathered themselves into a tiny
  phalanx the better to penetrate the woodwork with unmelodious noise, bawled
  the first chorus of _Good King Wenceslas_ then hammered the door in youthful
  expectation. At one house, an irate male voice answered the knock with, “I’ll
  have the bloody dog on you, if I open that door.”
  
  
  
  
  
  It was a sentiment Police Constable Adamson could understand.
  
  
  
  
  
  Snow (in the considered opinion of P.C. Adamson) was great stuff on Christmas
  cards. Off Christmas cards, you could keep it. Every last geometrically
  perfect shape. It didn’t even look nice. By the time the 