Blood & Sugar

Author Laura Shepherd-Robinson
Narrator Ben Onwukwe
Publisher Pan Macmillan
Run Time 13 hours and 11 minutes
Format Audio
Genre Crime and mystery fiction, Historical crime and mysteries, Historical fiction, History, Slavery and abolition of slavery, Thriller / suspense fiction.

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What to expect

‘A page-turner of a crime thriller . . . This is a world conveyed with convincing, terrible clarity’
C. J. Sansom

Blood & Sugar is the thrilling debut historical crime novel from Laura Shepherd-Robinson.

June, 1781. An unidentified body hangs upon a hook at Deptford Dock – horribly tortured and branded with a slaver’s mark.

Some days later, Captain Harry Corsham – a war hero embarking upon a promising parliamentary career – is visited by the sister of an old friend. Her brother, passionate abolitionist Tad Archer, had been about to expose a secret that he believed could cause irreparable damage to the British slaving industry. He’d said people were trying to kill him, and now he is missing . . .

To discover what happened to Tad, Harry is forced to pick up the threads of his friend’s investigation, delving into the heart of the conspiracy Tad had unearthed. His investigation will threaten his political prospects, his family’s happiness, and force a reckoning with his past, risking the revelation of secrets that have the power to destroy him.

And that is only if he can survive the mortal dangers awaiting him in Deptford . . .

Critics Review

Laura Shepherd-Robinson has written a story that is not only a page-turner of a thriller but, to an extent unusual in historical novels, where you feel you really are listening to a voice from the eighteenth century. This is a world conveyed with convincing, terrible clarity’

C. J. Sansom

A novel of astonishing skill

Financial Times

A tightly plotted crime story with vivid details of Georgian England

Sunday Times

Stunning . . . Blood & Sugar is a harrowing and brutal epic [that] shocks and thrills in equal measure

Express

A striking historical thriller . . . Few first novels are as accomplished as this

Andrew Taylor, author of The Ashes of London

Epic, harrowing, thrilling, brutal, addictive. I read it flat out in one day

C. J. Tudor, author of The Chalk Man

Magnificent . . . A tense and gripping historical thriller that shines an unwavering light on a dark period in British history. Unmissable.

Antonia Hodgson, author of The Devil in the Marshalsea

Phenomenal . . . A shoo-in for one of the books of the year

David Young, author of Stasi Child

Enthralling

Telegraph

Extraordinary

Caz Frear, author of Sweet Little Lies

A searing, ingeniously constructed story

The Times

Truly addictive

Jenny Quintana, author of The Missing Girl

A passionate indictment of British involvement in the slave trade but it never neglects its duty to chill and thrill

Sunday Express

With a hugely likeable hero at its heart, this rich and beautifully written debut marks out Laura Shepherd-Robinson as a major new talent

Fiona Cummins, author of Rattle

The finest Georgian intrigue

The Times Crime Club

A remarkably assured debut

Elizabeth Fremantle, author of The Queen's Gambit

A page-turning dive into the torrid depths of London in the 1780s

Mary Paulson-Ellis, author of The Other Mrs Walker

Gripping and original . . . I absolutely loved it

Karen Hamilton, author of The Perfect Girlfriend

Immersive and exhilarating . . . I was completely swept away

Holly Seddon, author of Love Will Tear Us Apart

Extraordinary, immersive, addictive and moving

Olivia Kiernan, author of Too Close to Breath

I can’t recommend it enough

Jo Jakeman, author of Sticks and Stones

Utterly compelling . . . The next star of historical crime fiction has arrived

R. N. Morris

The most absorbing, intelligent and breathtakingly atmospheric novel I’ve read in a long time

Chris Whitaker

I haven’t read such an accomplished historical novel since I was introduced to C.J. Sansom.

Jo Spain

A gripping mystery . . . I loved it

Laura Marshall, author of Friend Request

One of the best historical novels I’ve read in ages.

Kaite Welsh, author of The Wages of Sin

Deptford, a gateway to and from Britain’s expanding empire, is evoked in pungent detail. The British slave trade was an appalling episode in our history and the novel is unflinching in its refusal to sentimentalise motives or to row back on the savagery of the times.

Daily Mail

Highly recommended as best new thriller since C.J. Sansom and Andrew Taylor.

Amanda Craig

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