The Voices of the Dead - Book Launch by Nicola Upson

Nicola Upson is launching her new novel, The Voices of the Dead, at Waterstones on Thursday 5 November, from 18:00 to 19:30. It's the latest in her Josephine Tey series, which started back in 2008 with An Expert in Murder and was set in 1934. This one moves the clock forward into the Second World War.

The story opens on 10 May 1941, the last and worst night of the London Blitz. It follows Detective Chief Inspector Archie Penrose as he helps move the National Gallery's most precious paintings to the slate mines of North Wales. Josephine Tey, who alongside Agatha Christie was one of the masters of Britain's Golden Age of crime writing, and Noël Coward, then preparing his new play Blithe Spirit, are both holidaying in the area. A woman's grave discovered amid the debris of a roof fall plunges them into a forty-year-old mystery.

Upson is a Cambridge author, born in Suffolk and a Downing College reader. She's worked in theatre and as a freelance journalist, won an Escalator Award from Arts Council England, and was shortlisted for the CWA Historical Dagger in 2018 for Nine Lessons. This is her latest outing with the Tey series, which has now travelled from the mid-thirties into the war years.

The evening runs from 18:00 to 19:30 at Waterstones, 22 Sidney Street, Cambridge CB2 3HG. Tickets are £8 for general admission, or £20 if you want the book included.