C. O. Bonham

I am so excited to be a part of the blog tour for Enola Holmes and the Black Barouche. The Enola Holmes books were some of my favorites and I am beyond excited to help promote the newest installment.

This book is the seventh in the series and I had to wait so long for it. It’s been over ten years. Was it worth the wait? Keep reading for not only my review but also an excerpt from the upcoming book.

“A young girl who is empowered, capable, and smart…the Enola Holmes book series convey an impactful message that you can do anything if you set your mind to it, and it does so in an exciting and adventurous way.”–Millie Bobby Brown

Enola Holmes is back! Nancy Springer’s nationally bestselling series and breakout Netflix sensation returns to beguile readers young and old in Enola Holmes and the Black Barouche.

Enola Holmes is the much younger sister of her more famous brothers, Sherlock and Mycroft. But she has all the wits, skills, and sleuthing inclinations of them both. At fifteen, she’s an independent young woman–after all, her name spelled backwards reads ‘alone’–and living on her own in London. When a young professional woman, Miss Letitia Glover, shows up on Sherlock’s doorstep, desperate to learn more about the fate of her twin sister, it is Enola who steps up. It seems her sister, the former Felicity Glover, married the Earl of Dunhench and per a curt note from the Earl, has died. But Letitia Glover is convinced this isn’t the truth, that she’d know–she’d feel–if her twin had died.

The Earl’s note is suspiciously vague and the death certificate is even more dubious, signed it seems by a John H. Watson, M.D. (who denies any knowledge of such). The only way forward is for Enola to go undercover–or so Enola decides at the vehement objection of her brother. And she soon finds out that this is not the first of the Earl’s wives to die suddenly and vaguely–and that the secret to the fate of the missing Felicity is tied to a mysterious black barouche that arrived at the Earl’s home in the middle of the night. To uncover the secrets held tightly within the Earl’s hall, Enola is going to require help–from Sherlock, from the twin sister of the missing woman, and from an old friend, the young Viscount Tewkesbury, Marquess of Basilwether!

Enola Holmes returns in her first adventure since the hit Netflix movie brought her back on the national bestseller lists, introducing a new generation to this beloved character and series.

● Link to a buy-this-book page: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250822963

● NANCY SPRINGER is the author of the nationally bestselling Enola Holmes novels, including The Case of the Missing Marquess, which was made into the hit Netflix movie, Enola Holmes. She is the author of more than 50 other books for children and adults. She has won many awards, including two Edgar Awards, and has been published in more than thirty countries. She lives in Florida.

● Author’s Twitter: @NancySpringer

My Review:

*Thank you to Net Galley and Wednesday books for providing me with an advanced copy of this book. My opinions are my own and are provided willingly and honestly.*

Enola Holmes and the Black Barouche is the long awaited seventh novel in the Enola Holmes mystery series.

If you are a long time fan of this series then you will be most excited to know that this is truly book seven and not a Netflix tie in. The Movie was fine, but the books are better.

If you are just coming to the books, because you loved the Netflix movie, that’s fine, just be warned that this book has spoilers for the first six books in the series, which do have an over arching plotline. If you don’t care about spoilers the prologue to this novel includes a short summery of each of the previous Enola books. After a ten year break I admit I appreciated this refresher.

The Black Barouche is honestly the book in the series I most wanted while reading these books as a teenager. I was, and still am a big Sherlock Holmes fan, and this book finally sees Enola and Sherlock working on a case together. Well maybe not together. They are basically competing to see who solves it first. Seeing as they are sister and brother, this is the only natural outcome.

I just can’t get over how great this book was, Springer’s writing style is exactly the same and took me right back to when I binged the original six books in one month. Enola’s voice was just as confident and snarky as before. There is also the added bonus of revisiting Tewky from book one, and who Netflix viewers will recognize from the movie.

Each Enola Holmes book was centered around some aspect of Victorian society that related to women and most importantly to the injustices they faced at that time. The Black Barouche is no different, though this book may have the darkest injustice of all. It deals with the reality of how truly disposable women were.

A Nobleman writes his wife’s sister that she is dead. No explanation, no funeral, no body. Just, your sister is dead so sorry, don’t come round anymore. It’s up to Sherlock and Enola to discover what became of the late Lady Dunhench.

As is often the case in Victorian mysteries the true criminal is the law. The law that lets men, well men with money and power, do whatever they please without consequence. 

Excerpt:

“Is she fainted?”

Indignant, I wanted to sit up and say I was not so easily killed and I never fainted, but to my surprise my body would not obey me. I merely stirred and murmured.

“She’s moving.”

I saw the clodhopper boots of common men surrounding me and smelled alcohol on the breath of those leaning over me.

“Let’s get ’er inside.”

“Somebody go fer the doctor.”

Strong hands, not ungentle, seized me by the feet and shoulders. I could have kicked and yelled—I felt strong enough now—but my mind had started to function, realizing that I was about to be carried into a pub, for only in a public house, or pub, would workmen be drinking in the daytime. And normally no woman of good repute would enter a pub, or if she did, she would be jeered at until she retreated. But, my avid brain realized, fate in the form of Jezebel had given me opportunity to spend some time inside a pub—no, in the pub, most likely the only pub in Threefinches! So I closed my eyes and pretended to be rather more helpless than I was as the men hauled me inside and laid me down on a high-backed bench by the hearth.

Someone brought something pungent in lieu of smelling salts, but I shook my head, pushed the malodourous hand away, opened my eyes, and sat up, acting as if it were a great effort for me to do so. A burly, bearded man in an apron, undoubtedly the publican who kept the place, came running with a pillow for my back, and I thanked him with a gracious smile.

“Will ye have a nip of brandy, lydy?”

“No, thank you. Water, please.”

“Jack! Water for the lydy!” he bellowed to some underling, and he remained nearby as I managed, with hands that genuinely trembled, to remove my gloves. Their thin kidskin leather was ruined by the mauling it had taken from Jezebel’s reins, and my hands were red and sore; doubtless they would bruise. Grateful for the cool glass, I held it in both hands and sipped, looking around me. Half of the denizens of the place, like the owner, stood in a semicircle staring at me not unpleasantly, while the rest did the same from seats at the rustic tables—all but one. A tall man with beard stubble on his chin and quite a shock of coarse brownish-grey hair hiding his forehead had withdrawn to a table by the wall, where he devoted his attention to his mug of ale, or stout, or whatever noxious brew he might fancy. I said brightly to the tavern-keeper, “I believe I would like to stand up.”

“Now, why not wait for the doctor, lydy—”

But taking hold of his arm, as he stood within my reach, I got to my feet with reasonable steadiness. There were muted cheers from the onlookers. Nodding and simpering at the men all around me, I lilted, “Thank you so much. Do you suppose anyone could go out and fetch my bag, and my hat and parasol? I believe they fell along the—”

Already half a dozen would-be heroes were stampeding towards the door. Yet, if I had walked in here under my own power, any request for help would have been met with deepest suspicion. Such is life: odd.

Reminders:

The release date is August 31st.

You can read book seven even if you haven’t read the first six books but it will spoil those books for you.

Black Barouche pre-order/order links here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250822963

Have you read any of the Enola Holmes books?

How excited are you for the new installment?