Luckily for us readers, Stannert is the right woman in the right place.  Leadville was overflowing with shady deals, blackmail, con games, and, of course, murder.  In Leaden Skies one of the madam's prostitutes is attacked and later killed.  While Stannert investigates the murder Parker does an excellent job of showing us the crossroads between civilization and the frontier.

Getting historical fiction right is a challenge because the past is like a different country with its own culture, language and style.  But an author can't simply go back 130 years and look around.  Still, Parker says she's found ways to "visit" her setting.  She reads letters and newspapers from back then and studies references written in the day.  Art books help with the visual aspect, and she has a shelf full with lots of portraits from the period.  And, she points out, her research is not just virtual.

"I also visit present-day Leadville to walk the streets and capture those things that are timeless: the weather, the brilliance of the sunlight and the sharpness of the shadows; the color of the dirt; the sound the boardwalks make when people are walking on them; the feel of the wind."

She also makes the best use of local museums and historical societies.  This kind of in-depth research allows Parker to sit a great fictional story comfortably in the shadow of history, relating what could have happened nestled beside events that did take place.

Aside from the historic environment, Ann Parker surrounds Stannert with a large and diverse cast of characters.  Bystanders and suspects include a ruthless city tax collector, conniving mine owners, shady politicians, overzealous journalists, a secretive mapmaker, a prostitute with family obligations, and a mother with high hopes for her useless son.  These fully-realized characters keep the mystery twisting even while they reflect their time and place.

One advantage of setting a story in the 1880s is that the writer doesn't need to study forensic science, since forensics was in its infancy then.  At the time a sleuth needed only sharp eyes and sharp wits.  In fictional terms, Sherlock Holmes was just inventing the job of consulting detective.  In fact, one wonders what Stannert's contemporary Holmes might have thought of her, or she of him, had they met.

"I can imagine that, should Mr. Holmes and Mrs. Stannert have come face-to-face, he would have found her intuitive guesswork and her occasional blindness to clues very irritating," Parker said.  "Inez would probably have given him the once-over and curled her lip. She might also have found him a bit of a bore with his insistence on connecting the dots."

Of course, Leadville, Colorado was a world away from the London of the time, a city just booming instead of already beginning to decay.  Leadville in 1880 offered excitement and thrills way beyond what London could provide.  This difference alone will hold a thriller-lover's interest if he or she can pull her mind away from Leadville's fascinating inhabitants and the wonderfully satisfying corkscrew mystery that drives Leaden Skies to a resounding and satisfying conclusion.

Contributing editor Austin S. Camacho has written a series about private detective Hannibal Jones and a series of adventure novels featuring mercenary Morgan Stark and jewel thief Felicity O'Brien.  To pay the mortgage he answers media queries for the Defense Department.  Camacho lives in Springfield, Virginia with his lovely wife Denise and Princess the Wonder Cat