08/03/2024
This Tuesday my incredibly talented wife is coming out with a new murder mystery series.
And, much to my delight, this one is set in 1965 Vermont!
The first in the series, Agony Hill does a beautiful job of capturing the dynamic tension of a state going through dramatic change. The interstates are coming through, new people are moving in, the first Democrat Governor since the Civil War is hitting his stride alongside the federal policies that are changing the power dynamics, and anger over the war is starting to spill over into the rural communities of Vermont.
As Sarah dove into the research, including talking to many friends and family, we enjoyed learning the dynamics of the early back to the land migration, the strategies of the then-tiny state police force, and complexities of cultures colliding. What I found particularly intriguing was the active Cold War activities taking place in our small towns and back roads, in a place not too far from the major cities, but where one could hide in plain sight . . . or so they thought.
But you don’t have to take the word of a biased husband and known Vermont exceptionalist. The early reviews have been lovely and I particularly like this starred review from the Library Journal:
“The author of the Maggie D’arcy mysteries (A Stolen Child) launches a historical mystery series with a compassionate, vulnerable detective and a setting so vividly described it could be a character.”
Sarah is having her launch party at:
The Norwich Bookstore in Norwich, Vermont
Tuesday August 6th
7:00 pm
If you can't make it, preorders matter a lot in the world of publishing, so please consider ordering today online from your local bookstore or wherever you buy books!
Publisher’s description pasted below. Thank you for your support at the launch of this exciting new series.
- Matt
Proud Husband
Set in rural Vermont in the volatile 1960s, Agony Hill is the first novel in a historical series full of vivid New England atmosphere and the deeply drawn characters that are Sarah Stewart Taylor's trademark.
In the hot summer of 1965, Bostonian Franklin Warren arrives in Bethany, Vermont, to take a position as a detective with the state police. Warren's new home is on the verge of monumental change; the interstates under construction will bring new people, new opportunities, and new problems to Vermont, and the Cold War and protests against the war in Vietnam have finally reached the dirt roads and rolling pastures of Bethany.
Warren has barely unpacked when he's called up to a remote farm on Agony Hill. Former New Yorker and Back-to-the-Lander Hugh Weber seems to have set fire to his barn and himself, with the door barred from the inside, but things aren’t adding up for Warren. The people of Bethany―from Weber’s enigmatic wife to Warren's neighbor, widow and amateur detective Alice Bellows―clearly have secrets they’d like to keep, but Warren can’t tell if the truth about Weber’s death is one of them. As he gets to know his new home and grapples with the tragedy that brought him there, Warren is drawn to the people and traditions of small town Vermont, even as he finds darkness amidst the beauty.
