The Queen’s Dog by N.L. Holmes
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

‘The Queen’s Dog’ is another gripping and engaging historical crime novel by N.L. Holmes in her ‘An Empire at Twilight’ series. Set in the Syrian kingdom of Ugarit during the Bronze Age, Naheshi a eunuch slave falls in love with his Queen. Sadly for Naheshi he mistakenly thinks that his mistress, the Queen also loves him and so avoids spying on her when told to even under the threat of punishment. However when he realises that his mistress does not care for him at all he then does report all of her disloyal activities believing that the worse that will happen to her is a royal divorce. When her sentence of divorce turns into an execution Naheshi suffers with a guilty conscience and so vows to avenge his Queen and in doing so rid himself of his own guilt. This is obviously a well researched novel and it is wonderfully written in away which brings the time period and setting alive for the reader. I found the historical notes at the beginning of the book fascinating and the maps, glossary of names and terms and the genealogy of the royal characters were very helpful and I did refer back to them whilst reading. The storyline is fast paced and the plot twists kept me hooked from beginning to the end. The story is told by the main character, Naheshi‘s point of view and so we get to know him very well and I thought he was a well defined character who I could picture as I was reading the novel. This was an enjoyable read and I would recommend this novel which although part of a series can be read as a standalone story.

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