March 1925, and Eric Peterkin is now club secretary at the Britannia -- shuffled away to a lonely back office with more duties and responsibilities than he bargained for. And then Colonel Hadrian Russell, acting president since the events of A Gentleman’s Murder, is thrown from the window of the club lounge in an undeniable act of murder, and there can be no going back to the way things were.

Colonel Russell began the War with four strapping sons and ended it with four widowed daughters-in-law, to whom the club secretary must pay respects on behalf of the club: the gracious widow, the glittering professional, the glamorous vamp, and the girlish ingénue. "Respects" soon turn into a full-blown quest that takes Eric through Paris, to the Swiss alps, and back to London on a manhunt for an elusive spy. The world, it turns out, doesn’t stop turning just because the men are away at war, and the intrigues born then are no less deadly for having festered behind their backs.

1. Chapter one: Londinium
2. Chapter two: My Fair Ladies
3. Chapter three: Ulysses

Eric Peterkin is the hero of the story: an idealistic young man with Chinese ancestry on his mother’s side. The endorsement of the charming and immensely popular Colonel Russell seems to have eliminated any need for Eric to prove that he’s English enough, at least to the membership of the Britannia Club; but the appearance of Inspector Benedict Crane, newly returned from a decade-long stint with the Hong Kong police, leaves Eric with the uncomfortable sense of not being Chinese enough. If London’s roots lie with Rome via the Roman outpost of Londinium, then where do Eric Peterkin’s lie?

Christopher Huang grew up in Singapore and moved to Canada when he was seventeen. He returned to Singapore the following year to serve his two years of National Service, before moving on to McGill University to study Architecture. After several years living and working in Montreal, he now lives in Calgary.

A longtime fan of the "golden age" of detective fiction and the principles of fair play governing the genre, he is firmly of the belief that the primary attraction of detective fiction is that readers should be able to solve the mystery themselves from the given clues, prior to the grand denouement.

His other works include:

• A Gentleman’s Murder, the first instalment in the adventures of Eric Peterkin;
• Unnatural Ends, another interbellum mystery published by Inkshares;
• The Hero Unmasked!, an interactive adventure story published by Choice Of Games.

He is not the author of any medical textbooks. That’s someone else.

The book is expected to be released on 22 July 2025 in North America and on 25 September 2025 in the UK. Ask for it at your favourite bookstore!