Summary
Quitting her husband's house and moving back in with her horrible family, Lady Maccon becomes the scandal of the London season. Queen Victoria dismisses her from the Shadow Council and the only person who can explain anything, Lord Akeldama, unexpectedly leaves town. To top it all, Alexia is attacked by homicidal mechanical ladybugs, indicating, as only ladybugs can, the fact that all the London vampires are now very much interested in seeing Alexia quite thoroughly dead.
While Lord Maccon elects to get progressively more inebriated and Professor Lyall desperately tries to hold the Woolsey werewolf pack together, Alexia flees England for Italy in search of the mysterious Templars. Only they know enough about the preternatural to explain her increasingly inconvenient condition, but they may be worse than the vampires - and they're armed with pesto.
***Also available as a manga adaptation***
Gail Carriger is a New York Times Bestselling author. Her books are urbane fantasies mixed with steampunk. Her debut novel, Soulless, won the ALA's Alex Award and was nominated for the Compton Crook, Campbell, and Locus Awards. Changeless, Blameless, Heartless, Timeless, Soulless Vol. 1 (the manga), Soulless Vol. 2 (the manga of Changeless) were all New York Times Bestsellers. The first in her steampunk Finishing School series for young adults, Etiquette & Espionage, released Feb. 5 2013, was an instant NYT Bestseller. The second book in the Finishing School series, Curtsies & Conspiracies, released Nov. 5, 2013, and debuted at #5 on the NYT YA Bestseller list. In 2015 her title, Prudence, also made The New York Times High Profile Titles List.
(Bowker Author Biography)