I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Murder by the Book is a true crime novel centering around the death of Lord William and the scandal that surrounded the discovery of his body and subsequent trial.

This does a decent job of describing the main events of the crime, as well as the possibility of any literary influence over the murder itself with discussions about ‘sensationalist’ novels that were popular at the time. However I felt there wasn’t really much of a story to tell here. Large portions of the crime are fleshed out with descriptions and accounts that don’t really enrich the narrative, and unfortunately it just didn’t hold my attention. There’s also a rather large cast of characters that began to get rather confusing as the story progressed.

I think I would have found this more enjoyable if the book focused more on these popular Victorian novels rather than trying to fit the topic around one murder, as there may have been more material. There was a lot of potential to take this idea of ‘celebrity’ and the sensationalised criminal and to expand on it, perhaps moving on to other famous murders of the time and the reasoning behind why they were just so popular.

For a short novel it’s well researched, but I think the topic had potential to be a lot more interesting. It’s certainly piqued an interest in Victorian murder novels.