Why a Booktrail?
Destination: Skipton and Bolton Abbey Departure Time: 1920s
An Indian tragedy comes to the Yorkshire Dales
Murder on a Summer’s Day
What you need to know before your trail
Amateur sleuth detective Kate Shackleton receives an early morning telephone call from her cousin James who says that The India Office needs her help. A Maharajah, last seen on the Bolton Abbey estate, has gone missing and there is a hugely valuable diamond at stake. This would be a hugely embarrassing and tricky diplomatic incident if word got out so Kate has to be discreet but as she delves deeper into the mystery, there is a lot more at stake than she first realised.
Travel Guide
This novel is unique as it is inspired by true facts but woven around fiction and fictional characters. A friend of the author’s really did have a cousin who was as adventurous as Lydia in the novel and who married the Maharajah of Kapurthala. The Indian place names of Gattiawan, Kalatahal and Gundel are fictional but they do represent the states and the political battles of the Indian princes at the time.
Bolton Abbey
Bolton Abbey is a real hall but is not open to the public so this only features as Frances’s Brody’s imagination creates it.
“Bolton Abbey in case you are wondering, is not an Abbey. It is the name of a village, loosely used to refer to the area that forms the Duke of Devonshire’s estate”
Skipton
However Bolton Abbey and Skipton are communities within Yorkshire which are close knit and where secrets of an Indian and royal visitor would not go unnoticed. The novel begins as it did in the mind of the author in the Westy Bank Wood, on the Duke of Devonshire’s estate. This is also where the traders buy and sell, the hospital is located which takes in the victims and where the police are based.
Streetview Maps
C) Bolton Abbey - The Devonshire Arms Country House
E) Skipton High Street
Where Next?
