Martin is offered a job - to investigate the rise and fall of Strafford, an ambitious young politician whose downfall, in 1910, is as mysterious as the strange deaths that still haunt his family.

Plot wise, this is a 5 star mystery...not a thriller per se, more of a gradual burner, which builds in sophistication, complexity and urgency. Goddard always plays fair - the characters stay in character, and the inevitable coincidences are believable. The ending is very satisfying and well brought together. The reason for the 4* rather than a 5* review is because some of the supporting characters are simplistically either good or evil, and are not developed in any level of sophistication, sympathy or understanding - there are too manyAt a luxurious villa on the sun-soaked island of Madeira, unemployed historian Martin Radford is given a second chance. Martin is shown the leather-bound journal of another ruined man, former British cabinet minister Edwin Strafford. A wonderful read …the satisfying climax weaves together the strands of past and present.…A poised telling of a complex tale.” Publishers Weekly

The book is literary, political, plenty of crime and intrigue, romantic and absorbing. It surprised me how much I enjoyed it. The narrative moves steadily along although there are plenty of sections involved with the government of the time and with the history and actions of suffragettes. Strafford himself, his family and his life’s many secrets and discoveries are by far more noteworthy and remarkable than the markedly tarnished Radford, whose flaws Goddard uses to make him credible if not altogether likable. About three times during this book I found myself feeling that it was starting to drag. Each time, Goddard broke this feeling with a series of twists and revelations that nearly floored me on occasion, but I still feel this book could have done with a stricter editorial hand at the rudder. You could take virtually any passage from this book and it would read really well on its own, so I understand why you wouldn't want to cut any of it, but when you've got a pacing problem it's time to kill your darlings.Goddard's 1990 book Into the Blue was the inaugural winner of the W H Smith Thumping Good Read Award, presented to the best new fiction author of the year. Birthday Buoy (Harry Barnett). Included in First Edition: Celebrating 21 Years of Goldsboro Books (Dome Press, 2020) Martin Radford is a floundering, unemployed historian with a dim future who jumps at the chance to research the memoirs of Edwin Strafford, a young Edwardian cabinet minister and contemporary of Churchill and Lloyd George with a promising career that went mysteriously astray. Radford’s own blunders will unfold on this journey as he investigates Strafford’s past in this blended mix of politics, romance and historical thriller. He is given the opportunity of lifetime when he is asked to come to the island of Madeira, off the Portuguese coast, to listen to a proposal by a man named Leo Sellitt. He has bought an estate that used to belong to Edwin Stafford, appointed Home Secretary in 1908, who disappeared from politics under mysterious circumstances. Stafford left a journal behind that might shed light on his life. The premise of the book is wonderful. Set during the time of the Suffragette movement and Herbert Asquith as prime minister in 1910. He actually served as prime minister between 1908 and 1916. We are concerned with the fictional Home Secretary, at that time, called Edwin Strafford. Strafford had fallen in love with a suffragette, Elizabeth, but for reasons unbeknownst to us and Strafford himself, Elizabeth will not marry him due to something that Edwin had done and that he had kept from her. What was it?