I think I enjoyed this a little more than The Moor but on the whole it wasn't especially engaging. The action here takes place in Palestine over Christmas 1918/1919. This takes us back in time to the middle of the period covered by The Beekeeper's Apprentice and to an unmarried Russell and Holmes. For me the book just took too long to get going and I found Mary's narration pretty boring for a long while. I did get caught up in the action towards the end and I expect I'll pick up the next in this series when it appears in a cheap paperback version but it's getting to the point where I'm not sure that the good bits of this series are worth trudging through the tedious bits.