City of promises / Victoria Thompson ; with Ellen Thompson.

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Famed former police detective turned private investigator Frank Malloy and his wife, Sarah, come to Gideon Bates desperate for legal guidance. The Malloys' adopted daughter, Catherine, a burgeoning star of the stage, has announced her engagement to a man she barely knows. Catherine has recently gained access to her trust fund, and Sebastian Talbot appears very eager to marry her as quickly as possible. As Gideon and his wife, Elizabeth, investigate, it becomes all the clearer that Talbot may not be who he says he is. As a former con artist herself, Elizabeth suspects one may be in their midst. Undeterred by her pregnancy, she must pull out all the stops to out swindle a swindler and save another woman from ruin.

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Booklist Review

Victoria Thompson penned 25 books in The Gaslight Mysteries series and 8 books in the subsequent series, The Counterfeit Ladies. This book completes the latter, and was finished by Victoria's daughter Ellen after the author's death in 2024. It rounds out the saga of Frank and Sarah Malloy, the Gaslight husband and wife team, as they turn to Gideon and Elizabeth Bates, their Counterfeit Ladies counterparts, for help. Their adopted daughter, Catherine, a Broadway actress, has made what seems to them an unfortunate choice in her engagement to a man she hardly knows. If indeed it takes a thief to catch a thief, Elizabeth, a one-time con artist, is the woman for the job. Her takedown of the man revealed to be fraudster "Charming Billy" is epic--and remarkable, given that Elizabeth is expecting a child at a time when pregnant women were largely secluded. Set in 1921 in New York City, this book is rich in period detail of a time when newly won women's suffrage and the Ziegfeld follies occupied minds in the metropolis.

Kirkus Book Review

Combining two of her popular series, Gaslight Mysteries and Counterfeit Lady Novels, produces a fitting valedictory for Victoria Thompson, who died in 2024. Her daughter Ellen finished writing the book for her. Frank Malloy is a former New York City detective who inherited money and formed his own agency. His wife, Sarah, is from an old money family who went her own way to become a midwife and now runs a women's clinic. They approach upper-crust lawyer Gideon Bates--whose wife, Elizabeth, comes from a much different background--to help them with a difficult personal problem. After she lost her first love in World War I, Frank and Sarah's adopted daughter, Catherine, a well-known actress with money of her own, is set on marrying a man she hasn't known for long. Malloy has operatives tracking Sebastian Talbot and digging into his background, but so far they've found nothing on the man. Though Frank and Sarah hope Gideon knows of a way to legally protect Catherine's money, he has to disappoint them. Instead, Gideon discusses the matter with his mother and Elizabeth, whose father is the supreme con artist of New York. Elizabeth recognizes a con when she sees one, as she's run a few herself, and she and Gideon visit the Malloys to discuss the problem. The Malloys suggest they all meet in Catherine's dressing room after her performance the next night; they can go out for dinner afterwards and get to know Catherine and Talbot. Convinced that Talbot is indeed a con artist, Elizabeth decides they must run a con of their own to unmask him, and they all pitch in to help. A delightfully amusing story of competing cons with some socially relevant historical tidbits adding depth. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.