Delightfully Deadly

We’re pleased to present the signed limited edition, Delightfully Deadly, which contains three standalone novels set in New York Times bestselling author Gail Carriger's steampunk Parasolverse. 

The novels feature the exploits of graduates of Mademoiselle Geraldine's Finishing Academy, filled with manners, tricky lady spies, and supernatural creatures taking tea. Spinning off from the Finishing School series, these stories contain a great deal of forward flirtation between sweetheart gentlemen and deadly women. May also involve excessive use of velvet, melodramatic lobsters, and the strategic application of interpretive ballet.

Poison or Protect

In a battle of wits, Preshea may risk her own heart – a terrifying prospect, as she never knew she had one. 

ASSASSIN 

Lady Preshea Villentia, the Mourning Star, has four dead husbands and a nasty reputation. Fortunately, she looks fabulous in black. What society doesn’t know is that all her husbands were marked for death by Preshea’s employer. And Preshea has one final assignment. 

VERSUS SCOTSMAN 

It was supposed to be easy, a house party with minimal bloodshed. Preshea hadn’t anticipated Captain Gavin Ruthven – massive, Scottish, quietly irresistible, and… working for the enemy. 

Contains plaid, gentlemen eating dainty tea sandwiches, and the strategic application of leather gloves.

Defy or Defend

A vampire hive descending into madness. A beautiful intelligencer with a sparkly plan. The bodyguard who must keep them from killing each other. 

SPY 

Dimity Plumleigh-Teignmott, code name Honey Bee, is the War Office's best and most decorative fixer. She's sweet and chipper, but oddly stealthy, and surprisingly effective given the right incentives. 

VERSUS KNIGHT 

Sir Crispin Bontwee was knighted for his military service, but instead of retiring, he secretly went to work for the War Office. Mostly he enjoys his job, except when he must safeguard the Honey Bee. 

Neither one is a vampire expert, but when the Nottingham Hive goes badly Goth, only Dimity can stop their darkness from turning bloody. And only Crispin can stop an enthusiastic Dimity from death by vampire. 

In a battle for survival (and wallpaper), Dimity learns that not all that sparkles is good, while Cris discovers he likes honey a lot more than he thought. 

Ambush or Adore

London’s greatest and most covert spy tries to escape the man who has always adored her.

INTELLIGENCER

Agatha Woosmoss, the Wallflower, is the greatest intelligencer of her generation. And no one knows she exists. She has been invisible, capable, and cunning for well over four decades. Her greatest skill is in her ability to go forever unnoticed.

Except by one man.

VERSUS INTELLECTUAL 

Pillover Plumleigh-Teignmott is a professor of ancient languages at Oxford University. He’s done his best to ignore his training as an Evil Genius and live a quiet life away from politics and intrigue. 

With one major exception, Agatha Woosmoss. 

When an assignment goes horribly wrong, Agatha must hide and heal. So she goes to ground with the only person who’s always kept her safe, Pillover. 

Can Pillover hold onto the deadly woman who always gets away? Will Agatha realize that patience is indeed a virtue, and that perhaps it is good to be noticed by the one who waits? 

Limited: 1000 signed numbered hardcover copies

Lettered: 26 signed leatherbound copies, housed in a custom traycase

Poison or Protect
(excerpt)

Gavin knew who she was the moment he saw her. He also knew there was a good chance he would have to kill her. Assuming, of course, she didn’t kill him first.

Lady Preshea Villentia. The Mourning Star. Widowed too many times under suspicious circumstances, too smart to be caught, and too beautiful to be ostracized. She was like opiates—expensive, intoxicating, and deadly in large doses.

He wasn’t sure exactly how he knew it was Lady Villentia. They’d never been introduced. They didn’t attend the same social functions (her circles being more rarefied than those of a mere army captain).

Also, she was standing with her back to him.

Yet he did know her.

He’d read the papers and dismissed their breathless descriptions as romanticized nonsense. He’d seen the sketches and assumed a great deal of artistic license. To his chagrin, he realized now that neither had done her justice.

She moved into profile.

The lady was a porcelain doll, perfect in every detail, delicate as fine china and no doubt more costly. Yet she directed the porters with the sure command of any field marshal.

Defy or Defend
(excerpt)

Sir Crispin Bontwee chivvied up to an impressively large chartreuse front door with a sense of overwhelming relief. Not because of the color of the door, mind you (which was a touch assertive, frankly, for a door—what did it think it was playing at?) but because of the possibilities that lay behind it.

The door opened, and the possibilities proved themselves to be a female of biblical proportions and eccentric dress. She was that particular style of solid British womanhood that held firm against both military invasion and recalcitrant pie crusts, rolling pin wielded with consummate skill in either case.

Sir Crispin knew her of old.

He bowed slightly and hid his grin, because both woman and door demanded respect. “My dear Madame, what a pleasure to see you again.”

“It’s you, is it?” Mrs Bagley pursed her lips to hide her delight and threw the door wide.

“At your service.” He strode inside, fairly vibrating with suppressed excitement. It had been ages since his last mission. He was restless with a need to fix something, or rescue someone, or perhaps both.

Ambush or Adore
(excerpt) 

Pillover Plumleigh-Teignmott’s biggest problem was that he met the love of his life when he was twelve years of age and then spent the rest of that life misplacing her.

Or more to the point, she kept intentionally misplacing herself.

If Pillover were to give love advice to anyone (which he wouldn’t, because his expertise was in obscure ancient languages and certainly not love or, heaven forfend, romance) he’d tell them not to fall in love with a spy. Plays hell with one’s heart, not to mention one’s wardrobe and peace of mind.

Trying to hold onto an intelligencer was like grabbing for soap in a bathtub—very slippery and always causing a great deal of emotional splashing about that got everything wet and messy, but didn’t ever really affect the soap. And one couldn’t very well blame the soap, could one? After all, it’s in its nature to slip away, again and again.