I have continued to respect the life of Charles Dickens and kept him doing the work and walking the streets that he did during the timeline of my book to the best of my knowledge. Not that I think he was ever an amateur sleuth or worked briefly as a private secretary. My plot is entirely fictitious, as is most everyone in the book.
BOOK CLUB READING GUIDE for
A Christmas Carol Murder
1. Charles Dickens’s novella A Christmas Carol inspired aspects of this novel. What themes did you recognize? Does reading this book make you want to read or reread Dickens’s work?
2. A Christmas Carol has been filmed in many ways many times. Which is your favorite version? Do you like it when the comedic aspects are emphasized or the macabre?
3. A Christmas Carol is a paranormal tale. Do you expect otherworldly elements to be part of any work that refers back to A Christmas Carol?
4. Did you know that Dickens is considered to have brought back the celebration of Christmas to England? What is it about his fiction that stimulated this change?
5. What did you think the addition of the infant Timothy character added to the story? Did Charles do the right thing where he was concerned?
6. How did you react to the Hogarths’ behavior around the Timothy rumors? Were you on their side or Charles’s?
7. Discuss the Charles/Kate relationship in this book. How did you feel they both handled themselves given the stresses they were under?
8. Usually in fiction of this kind, you’d see characters like the mudlarks appearing to gather information the sleuth could not. Instead, this series has been breaking up the mudlark team and moving them off the foreshore. Why do you think the author approached the mudlark story in this fashion?
9. What do you think the relationship of Mr. Screws and Mrs. Pettingill will be in the future?
10. Did Charles treat Johnny Dorset appropriately? Given the times he lived in, is there anything he could have done differently?
11. Lady Lugoson found herself a new husband in this book. Were you surprised by the person she chose?
12. Which character would you say has changed the most in the series over these three titles? Do you like what has happened to them?
A Christmas Carol Murder Page 29