Without Fear — Cordelia Frances Biddle

Critics have lauded Cordelia Frances Biddle's historical series featuring heiress Martha Beale. The indomitable heroine returns in Without Fear when a decapitated corpse is discovered at Joseph Bonaparte's palatial estate near Philadelphia. A vanished wife, a former actress with an agonizing secret, and a mill worker accused of murder reveal the dark and convoluted connections between wealth and poverty, and the tenuous link between grief and joy.