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Jodi Taylor always drops a new short story on Christmas Day and I usually manage to read it same day, but we got a dinner invitation so I just managed to squeeze this in before New Year. It’s charming and funny, based on the Agatha Christie style of murder mystery. Leon takes Max back to the 1920s for a week of R&R in a country house hotel. Food, rest, tea, and more food. It’s all going terribly well until a body falls at Max’s feet – literally – and despite the fact that the house is full of (deliberately) cliché Christie-esque characters with dark secrets, Leon is the only one without an alibi. A short read, but a fun one.Tags:
Re-read via Audible. 
This is a re-read via Audible. Audiobook read by Zara Ramm
This is a re-read via Audible. Audiobook read by Zara Ramm
Audiobook read by Zara Ramm
Barely recovered from their last adventure (on the train) Team 236 (Team Weird - Luke, Jane and Matthew) are tentatively back in business (though still under supervision), but things aren't going well for the Time Police in general. Construction work reveals (or rather re-reveals) a huge cover-up from that last days of the time war, before Commander Hay became the TP boss, but it's something she'll have to deal with one way or another. A dinosaur shows up in Wales, which causes Hay to request the assistance of Maxwell from St Mary's. No one is quite sure which is going to be the biggest problem, Max or the dinosaur. In Ancient Rome, a St Mary's mission is trying to find out what happened to the city's founder, Romulus, when TP officer Varma turns up and kidnaps him. There's a gnarly knot in the time map which Matthew spots, but can he unravel it? And then everything goes tits-up when a time pod AI starts screaming murder. When long-time antagonist Henry Plympton reappears with a scheme to kidnap and murder the Princes in the Tower, things can't get much worse for the beleaguered Time Police. This book does feature Luke, Jane and Matthew, but also hefty chunks of Commander Hay and her long-suffering adjutant, Charlie Farrenden, Lt. Grint and his usual team, plus the aforementioned Varma and assorted characters we've met before. This book was published on 9th and by 10th October I'd galloped through it. A new Jodi Taylor is always a drop-everything-and-grab-it moment. Glad I did. The only thing missing was Markham... or was he?
I had this book as an ARC (Advanced Reader Copy) from the publisher via NetGalley and was very pleased to be able to take a peek before publication. I've read all the other Elizabeth Cage book (and every Jodi Taylor book I can get my hands on) so I was really looking forward to this - and it did not disappoint. Note for new readers, this in NOT the place to start. Go back and read White Silence, Dark Light and Long Shadows before tackling this one. Elizabeth Cage can read people's auras. She sees them as colours and can tell their mood and whether they are lying or not. No one can keep a secret from her. In White Silence, this led to a great deal of trouble via Doctor Sorensen in the wake of the sudden death of Elizabeth's husband, Ted. Incarcerated in Sorensen's clinic, Elizabeth met Michael Jones, a somewhat shady character with dark governmental connections. In the previous three books they saved each other (a lot), and as this fourth book opens Elizabeth is living a quiet life, which is exactly how she likes it - or does she? Things are changing. Something happened last Christmas that she can't quite remember, and on top of that she might have accepted a freeelance job from an unnamed government department that Jones seems very familiar with. And then she finds blood on her doorstep. Iblis and his mangy dog, Nigel turn up. Iblis speaks in eighteenth century cadences and likes to eat fish and chips, drink Elizabeth's beer and watch her TV. His partner, Melek, is something of an enigma and might or might not have powers, but certainly knows a lot more about Elizabeth than she's telling. Then Elizabeth gets a note, apparently in her own handwriting: 'I always send the serpent...' Elizabeth doesn't know what's going on which, apparently, is for her own good. Yeah, right. During the course of this book she finds out. Written in Jodi Taylor's quirky style this is a supernatural thriller. Expect danger, magic, revisiting the scenes of former adventures and - oh yes - a serpent. Something is trying to rise from the darkness under a bad moon. Highly recommended.
Calvin Cutter, film maker extraordinaire, returns to St Mary’s to make a new series of Tempora the Time Travelling Tourist, and Max is tasked with babysitting Astrid Gustafssen, the series star. What could possibly go wrong? Well, for starters Adrian, one of the teapot time travelling siblings, takes Astrid to Troy, and loses her. Unfortunately most of St Mary’s staff were in Troy at that time, so since you can’t go back to a time you’ve already visited, only Max, Markham, Adrian and Evans can form a search party and both Max and Markham will die at midnight if they don’t get out of Troy before their younger selves arrive. No pressure then. And while they’re at it they encounter Odysseus and Diomedes on a secret mission to steal the Palladium which ultimately leads to the fall of Troy. Once again, history hangs in the balance. I love Jodi Taylor's St Mary's books.
This is the origin story of Lady Amelia Smallhope and Pennyroyal, butler of many talents. When Millie Smallhope’s brother George marries a fortune hunter and her family falls apart, she’s shuffled off to a finishing school. Trying to get her diamonds back from her sister-in-law, she comes nose to nose with a burglar who turns out to be much better at thievery than she is, and she ends up throwing her lot in with him – Pennyroyal – who just happens to have a time-travelling pod, and be a product of Butler school, though Millie suspects he learned all he knows in the nick. The two embark on a career as bounty hunters – err – recovery agents – and we follow their exploits, including where their story intersects with the St Mary’s crew of disaster-magnet historians, and the Time Police, especially Team Weird. This is very engaging, and I stayed up far too late into the night because I couldn’t put it down. Shades of Modesty Blaise and Willie Garvin with a time pod.
A short introduction to the world of Jodi Taylor's historians who investigate historical events in contemporary time. (Don't call it Time Travel.)
A Frogmorton Farm short story featuring Jenny and Russell Checkland and an invisible golden horse called Thomas, who smells of warm ginger biscuits, and who helped Jenny over a rough period in her growing-up years. The Checkland kids are off on a school trip, so Jenny and Russell are looking forward to some couple-time. Unfortunately a storm front is moving in and the power is out. When Jenny's dangerous cousin Christopher shows up, things aren't looking good for Jenny. Her aunt is in trouble and fear (as well as rain) is in the air.
Team 236 (Team Weird) Matthew Farrell, Jane Lockland and Luke Parrish, are barely talking to each other after their adventures and the revelations in the previous two books (Hard Time, and About Time). Jane and Lt Grint are still dancing around each other, a mixture of attraction, insecurity and embarrassment. Mikey (Amanda Meiklejohn) is now doing research for the Time Police, and her experiment with rapid-hardening string leaves a good proportion of officers temporarily encased, so when two teenagers are reported to have built a pod and gone trainspotting to Rome in 1911, Team 235 is called to action. The train being spotted is the notorious Zanetti train which left Rome, entered a tunnel and was never seen again. Things get complicated when Sawney, a misogynistic ex-Time Police Officer who has bad history with Jane, turns up. He and the boys, plus Jane and Luke end up on board the doomed train, which is destined to bounce around the timeline like a runaway ghost train. This book is mostly a linear story of the train, Luke and Jane's attempts to get off it, Matthew's adventures in the Time map, trying to discern its whereabouts (and whenabouts), and Lt Grint's Team 236, efforts hurtling after the train to rescue their missing officers. (Though, let's face it, Grint is mostly about rescuing Jane and if he saves Luke as well, no harm done.) A straightforward story which enhances the relationship between Team Weird and Grint, who is possibly not as dumb as he has appeared to be in the past, and also reveals a secret that the TP is hiding which sows a little seed for the future. Another excellent book from Jodi Taylor.
Jenny Checkland, now married to volatile and eccentric artist, Russell, and mother to baby Joy. Should be safely free of her grasping and cruel family. Her chaotic life with Russell, Boxer the nervous horse, Marylin the noisy donkey, a bunch of Patagonian Attack Chickens, a snooty neighbour, Bill the insurance man who is courting the Checklands' housekeeper, Mrs Crisp, and a magnificent golden horse called Thomas who smells of warm ginger biscuits, and whom no one but Jenny can see. And then Jenny's dangerous cousin Christopher turns up with malice and greed in his heart, helped by Jenny's eveil uncle. Quirky and engaging, this is nicely narrated by Lucy Price-Lewis
This was almost the last book I read in December. Review here: 
St Mary’s is at war – with the local Women’s Institute, the Raffia Mafia. This year the Christmas jump isn’t illegal. It isn’t even at Christmas, but the honour of St Mary’s kitchen is at stake so Max, Peterson, Markham and Sykes, have one job, to travel to Restoration London and buy a selection of authentic Christmas Pies so that Mrs Mack can reverse engineer them and beat the WI at the next Christmas Fair. Unfortunately, it’s not as straightforward as it might be – well, of course, this is St Mary’s after all and the tea-soaked disaster magnets have been let loose again. This time, instead of Max, Markham is the narrator. He has cogent insights into the Bashford v Sykes relationship, especially as Angus (Bashford’s chicken) makes is a lopsided threesome, and Sykes has another serious admirer. I bought the audiobook immediately – ready for a new year listen. Highly recommended. New readers should start at the beginning to get full value out of this excellent series.
I love all things Jodi Taylor and I read this on the day it was published, but I’ve only just got around to listening to the audiobook. Once again, competently read by Zara Ramm. Lt Grint finally shows his humanity and it gets both himself and Jane into a lot of trouble as he tries to help a small boy whose mother has disappeared.
More adventures of Elizabeth Cage who can read people's colours (auras) which makes her at the top of Dr Sorensen's wanted list. He's not quite sure what she can do, but he knows she'll be an asset to both him and his government bosses. This book open immediately after White Silence finishes, when Elizabeth is once more on the run from Sorensen's flunkies and from Michael Jones whom she was beginning to trust, but is no longer sure about. 
This is a re-read, or rather a re-listen. It’s the first Elizabeth Cage book, and most unusually for a Jodie Taylor audiobook, this time not read by Zara Ramm, but by Katie Scarf. She makes a good job of the reading. Elizabeth Cage can see colours surrounding people – their auras, though she doesn’t use that term. She can tell their moods and their state of being, whether they are happy or unhappy, troubled or serene, good or evil. When her husband Ted dies she is tricked by Sorensen, his boss into staying over at the Sorensen private clinic and is kept there under threat of being sectioned. Sorensen, it turns out, has been curious about Elizabeth’s abilities and has been watching her for years. Now he has the opportunity of finding out what she can do. Enter Michael Jones, another inmate at the clinic – or is he? Well, yes he is, but he’s more than that. No spoilers. Elizabeth begins to trust him, but should she? The ending is not quite cliffhanger but it’s definitely open to a follow-up.
I always rush to get the new Jodi Taylor as soon as there’s one on the horizon. I love the St Mary’s books about a bunch of disaster-prone historians who research historical events in contemporary time. (Please don’t call it time travel.) Following on from the previous book, Max is currently not on staff at St Mary’s, she’s taken up bounty hunti—err, being a recovery agent, with Markham, Smallhope and Pennyroyal, but there’s the matter of Insight, a group from the future using time travel for its own shady ends, and also St Mary’s director has been shot and Max might be the number one suspect. (She didn’t do it, honest!). Max is trying to take down Insight but she’ll be betrayed. She knows this because it’s already happened in the future. Max and Markham are my favourite characters, and this book gives me a great double-helping.
I love all things Jodi Taylor and her annual Christmas short story is a highlight. Instead of the traditional St Mary's illegal Christmas jump, we get the Time Police on their scariest mission yet, organising a Christmas party for a bunch of orphans to show the softer side (yes, that's right) of the bastard law enforcers. A Christmas party, an orphanage boy waiting for his mother. The taciturn Lt Grint finally has a glimmer of sympathy, but it could get him into deep trouble and he might drag others down with him - if they survive.
An Audible re-read of the short story in which we see Dr Bairstow travelling back from the future to set up St Mary’s Institute for Historical Research, getting the funding and acquiring the core staff, Major Guthrie, Markham, Dr Helen, Mrs Mack, Dr Dowson and Professor Rhapson etc. and finally Leon. It raises as many questions as it answers. How much of what’s about to happen does Dr Bairstow already know? Does he know who lives and who dies? Which timeline/parallel universe are we in?
Audiobook.
For a full review of the story see: https://jacey.dreamwidth.org/684676.html
Audiobook re-read 25/10/22. Zara Ramm is an excellent reader, and the perfect voice for both Max and Markham as they begin their alternative time-tripping career. There are some loose threads at the end of this book, regarding Max's next move against the agency that has already tried to kill her three times, and the potential fate of Treadwell, not to mention Hyssop, who might just be not as bad as we think she is. I'm already looking forward to Book #14
I’m a big Jodi Taylor fan, so I pre-ordered this and started reading it as soon as it appeared in my Kindle. The Time Police books are a spin off from the St Marys sequence and there’s often crossover. The main characters are Luke Parrish, Jane Lockland and Matthew Farrell, Team 236, or Team Weird as they are often known. Matthew is the son of Max and Leon, from St Marys, which is where the crossover usually happens. In this book, we’re still in the fallout range from adventures at Site X (in ‘Hard Time,’ the second Time Police book). As I suspected from the two previous books, Henry Plimpton, Mr P., is proving to be a perpetual, ruthless antagonist. There’s the mystery of what happened to Jane’s parents, because the real story is not what her awful grandmother told her. A couple of murders at Time Police headquarters prove that there’s a traitor in their midst – which is a massive problem for Commander Hay, longsuffering head of the organisation. Added to all that there’s a will-they won’t-they thing going on between Jane and Lt Grint. Expect weirdness from Amelia Meiklejohn, now working for the Time Police rather than running away from them. This is delightful, though not the place to start if you’re new to the Time Police books. I suggest you read them in order – better still, start with the first St Mary’s book and pick them all up in order. Highly recommended.
Max and Markham have left St Mary's, but has St Mary's really left them? They are bounty hunte—er—recovery agents working with Lady Amelia Smallhope and her fearsome butler, Pennyroyal. Max wonders if she's going mad. Zipping around the timeline is seriously affecting her physically and mentally. She needs to reset her body clock before the ghosts of the past kill her. But her idyllic recuperation time with husband, Leon, and son, Matthew, comes to a very abrupt end. When Max and Markham set out to scupper a sinister organisation, founded in the future, but affecting the past, they really do bite off more than they can chew. Was this shadowy organisation behind their arch-enemy, Ronan? 
Jodi Taylor's Christmas day short story. This is set during the events of 'Another Time Another Place' when St Mary's is under Treadwell's new (unfriendly) management. It's Christmas, and rather than being with their respective families Max and Markham are away from St Mary's, enjoying the hospitality of Lady Amelia Smallhope and her bodyguard/butler/thug, Pennyroyal, currently employed as bounty hunters, or, rather, recovery agents. There's a Flying Auction announced. Someone is auctioning off plundered historical artefacts at a specific place and time… and that place happens to be a near-derelict St Mary's in 1921. Markham manages to appropriate some of the aforementioned items (don't ask what he's got down his trousers) so they have to hide them, and return to St Mary's in their own time to retrieve them. Expect tea, toast and eggs, Parish Councillors, naked gardening and a very happy Christmas.
This is the third outing for Team Weird (Team 236), Matthew, Luke and Jane, almost ready to graduate from their training in the Time Police. It follows on from the second book and there are still elements of the aftermath from their adventures at Site X. Luke has lost two fingers to frostbite and is convinced that his father, head of Parrish industries, is the Mr Big (or rather Mr P) behind Site X, but he can't unearth any proof. After graduation, Jane is flattered to be chosen to help another team and discovers that there are as many dangers from her fellow officers as there are from criminals. After graduation, Team 236 go to check on a known miscreant, believed to be harmless, only to discover a gaping crater where his street used to be. Thus begins another adventure in this series which is a spin-off from, and crossover with, the Chronicles of St Mary's. This seems to be setting up a big bad for Team Weird, just as Clive Ronan was the big bad in the St Mary's books. Expect major peril, a touch of awkward romance, and guest appearances from the St Mary's cast of characters - mainly Max (Matthew's mum) and Mikey (Matthew's special girl). Jodi Taylor is a buy-on-sight author for me. Highly recommended. When I'd finished reading I immediately listened to the audible version, which is read beautifully by Zara Ramm.
St Mary's Institute of Historical Research investigates historical events in contemporary time. (Don't ever call it time travel!) Having got arch enemy Ronan out of the way in the previous book, things should be looking up for St Mary's in general and Max, Leon and their son, Matthew, in particular, but Dr Bairstow is worried that the authorities are likely to interfere in the running of St Mary's. He sends Leon off on a jaunt to discover a new remote site, a secret bolt-hole to which all the staff can decamp (with the archive) at a moment's notice. So Leon, Matthew and the two teenage geniuses (Adrian and Mikey) who are currently sheltering from the Time Police, are not involved (much) in this book. And it looks as if we've lost Markham too (one of my very favourite characters). He's taken his family somewhere safe (away from Governmental Powers That Be) since he and Hunter now have a baby daughter. Why is that a problem? You'll have to read the big reveal about Markham in 'Plan for the Worst.' Ms Taylor is careful not to divulge Markham's origin in this book, though there are little Easter Eggs for those in the know. (Yes I do know Markham's origin story and no I'm not revealing it in this review.)
A short story in the Frogmorton Farm series. Joy, Russell and Jenny Checkland's now teenage daughter, is being – well – a teenager, and driving her parents mad. She's a teenager – it's in the job description. So when a friend invites her to a concert in the park, despite being grounded, Joy decides to go. Yes it's another glimpse into life at Frogmorton farm with all its wacky cast of characters, but also it's a warning against the perils of online-only friendships. And yes, Thomas the golden horse who smells of warm ginger biscuits, makes an appearance. Jodi Taylor is always readable, so this is enjoyable, if short.
My full review of the book is here: 
This is newly published (15th October). I read an advance copy on Kindle in September but had to wait until publication day for the audiobook. I won't go over my book review again because it was published here barely a month ago. It's here if you want to read it: 
What happens when Max's husband meets her father. Max had an unhappy childhood, largely due to her father, and Leon knows all about this, so when Max's father decides Max is too feckless to bring up Matthew, she has a problem, which means Leon and the whole of St Marys has a problem. They can't kill him, but just imagine what a bunch of really inventive people can do to someone they really don't like. This is narrated from Leon's point of view, so we get a brief glimpse of Leon's past, how he lost his first family, and his first meeting with Max.
There are two audio versions of this. One is in the short story collection 'The Long and the Short of It' read by Zara Ramm. The second is a single-release version read by Piers Wehner. This is one of the Christmas Short Stories, and takes Max, Peterson and Markham away from the seasonal festivities at St Mary's (where Markham was planning to be the back end of a reindeer) to check on whether Alfred the Great really did burn the cakes. (Alfred didn't, Markham did!) For a change the whole thing is written from Markham's point of view, which is probably why Audible has released a version narrated by a man (Piers Wehner). I've listened to almost all of the Jodi Taylor's St Mary's books, and all have been read by Zara Ramm. She voices Markham beautifully, complete with his Bristol accent, and therefore she does an excellent job or narrating this whole story. Piers Wehner doesn't do a bad job of narrating the alternate version. He definitely has an accent but it's not quite (obvious) Bristol, more like a generic South East. He is, however a lovely dynamic reader. Which do I like best? I like both and either is well worth listening to.
The traditional St Mary's Christmas jump takes Major Ian Guthrie, together with Peterson and Markham to the Battle of Bannockburn for Guthrie's final retirement jump. When they fail to return on time, Max and Evans (security) go after them. They discover snipers (always come in pairs) and bounty hunters: Lady Amelia Smallhope, and her butler, Pennyroyal. Elspeth Grey, former historian, and Guthrie's partner, gets her mojo back. There's another tantalising glimpse of Markham's backstory. Having now read the book which reveals Markham's 'dirty little secret' as mentioned by Major Guthrie to Max at the beginning of this story, I can say that Jodi Taylor's hints offered here and in The Steam Pump Jump do eventually come to fruition. One fascinating observation (by Guthrie) is that though Markham has a Bristol accent now, he went through the army as a Geordie. 
A kind of prequel to all of the St Mary's books tells about the civil uprisings against the corrupt government, and how St Mary's stalwarts, Mrs Mack (catering), Mrs Shaw (PA), and Mrs Enderby (costume), ended up manning the Battersea Barricades on St George's Day on the decisive day of the civil war. The civil unrest has been referred to before in other stories, but this is the first timew we've seen any detail. The three of them have individual journeys and come together on that final day, to face down a helicopter gunship with nothing but their courage and each other. They tell their story to Max on the many-years-later anniversary. Zara Ramm narrates beautifully, as usual.
While Max, the usual viewpoint character of the St Mary's stories, is laid up in the infirmary with broken bones, having fallen off the roof in the previous St Mary's book, she has a brilliant idea which she leaves to Markham to carry out. 
This is the first book in Jodi Taylor's Time Police series which is a spin off from her popular Chronicles of St Mary's and as you might expect there's some crossover. One of the three main characters is Matthew, son of Max and Leon from St Mary's. Matthew had a troubled childhood, spending his first eight years (after being kidnapped) dodging around the timeline being sold into squalid jobs and finally becoming a climbing boy for a cruel chimney sweep. Eventually rescued, he took a long time to adjust and spent part of his formative years at school with the Time Police, so maybe it was to be expected that eventually he'd join up. He's teamed up with mild, timid Jane who joined the time police to get away from her dragon of a grandmother, and rich playboy, Luke, who was delivered to the time police by his father's secretary to teach him a lesson. The Time Police were formed a long time ago in the future, their job was to protect the timeline from rogue time travellers trying to kill Hitler or save Richard III at Bosworth. You can't change history because history has a way of striking back. They spent many years shooting first and asking questions later, but times are changing. Most of the recruits fit the bullish pattern, but Matthew, Jane and Luke do things their own way. Eventually they bond to become 'Team Weird.' Like the St Mary's books this is narrated by Zara Ramm. She's an excellent reader for Ms Taylor's work, her reading bringing out the dry wit of the author's voice. Expect some of the St Mary's characters to pop up in the story.
This is a different version to the Audible narration by Zara Ramm that I listened to and loved a few months ago. (
The second book in the St Mary's spin off series featuring Luke, Jane and Matthew (who is the son of Max Maxwell and Leon Farrell from St Mary's). The three of them are still trainee Time Police officers, known as Team Weird for their unorthodox ways of tackling situations that alternately drive Commander Hay slightly bonkers, while actually appreciating their originality (though she'd never tell them that, of course). This time they are sent to the seventeenth century to rescue a politician's daughter who has been dumped by a team of illegal time tourists. Unfortunately she turns out to be one of Luke's exes and she's not happy to be rescued, especially by him. She does, however give away some details of the illegal time travel organisation and Luke and Jane go undercover to see what information they can ferret out while Matthew spends some quality time with the time map. Expect peril, timeslips, Marie Antoinette, and Luke's mouth on overdrive. There's a brief intervention from St Mary's, some familiar character (Officer North, Major Ellis) and a fast-paced adventure. Jodi Taylor is one of my favourite authors, and this does not disappoint. I had this as an advance review copy from Netgalley. Publication is 15th October 2020.
This is what I wrote when I read this for the first time in 2016. 
Another re-read (or listen). This is the one where Max joins the Time Police in order to catch Ronan. There's a trip to the Tudor period where Max is trying to fix history-gone-wrong by preventing the assassination of Mary Tudor
There's a quick trip to see Henry VIII fall off his horse and a trip to Persepolis, but Clive Ronan is still causing chaos up and down the timelines, so Max and the time police set a trap for him. Well, it seems like a good idea, but when have Max's good ideas ever worked? As a result, Max is dumped in the Medieval period and no one knows where she is. She knows where she is - in St Mary's but about 600 years in the past. She has to learn to live there and to make a new life for herself because she doubts she'll ever get home again. She's desperately missing Leon, but there's someone in 1399 who can offer her protection. She knows Leon would be the first to tell her to find a way to survive, even if that means marrying.
This collects together all the short stories (thus far) from the Chronicles of St Mary’s, which if you haven’t read them, go back and start from the beginning. I’ll wait. Done it? Good. Now you know about the time travelling disaster-magnets who comprise St Mary’s historians and their support teams, especially Max our (usually) main viewpoint character. (I particularly love reading about Markham in security.) I’d read (and reviewed) all but one of these before because I buy anything from Jodi Taylor on sight, but I was happy to buy it for the new story, which has since been published as an individual short, but it’s good to have all the short stories together in one place and if you haven’t read any of them yet, it’s a bargain.
I adore Jodi Taylor’s Chronicles of St Mary. This is the eighth and she’s not running out of places to take the story. Still quirky, this is darker than the rest because Clive Ronan is back and he’s even more determined to inflict pain and suffering on Max, her family and all the staff at St Mary’s. There’s some gut-wrenching stuff in this as well as Jodi Taylor’s usual wit. It’s a laugh-and-cry rollercoaster and not everyone makes it to the last page. The history side of it is, as usual, fascinating, from the Egyptian desert to the Battle of Stamford Bridge.
Another re-read via Audible. In my blog of the initial kindle read I said... To begin with Max and her partners in crime (literally this time) Peterson and Markham are in deep trouble, having done the wrong thing for the right reasons - or maybe it was the right thing… but no one else sees it that way, It all starts when they accidentally get caught up in a battle involving (King) Arthur and spot an opportunity. Things go sour. They try to set it right and end up almost under house arrest. Regardless of her burgeoning pregnancy Max tries to make amends with another wild scheme. It would have worked out well without Max's arch-enemy Ronan stepping in. There's a real race against time at the end.
I read this on kindle in 2016 and am now blazing through the audiobooks and thoroughly enjoying them. In my review of the kindle book I said: After the incidents in No Time Like The Past, Max is on light duties for six months while she fully recovers from various injuries, so she swaps departments with Petersen and takes on the mantle of head of training. It should be easy because there are no trainees… until there are and Max has to not only devise a new training programme but keep her unruly charges under control, preferably without killing or injuring them. If that's supposed to be light duties I'd hate to see what she'd end up doing on normal duties. She has five students, some of them almost as bolshy as she was herself, but it turns out to be the quiet ones you have to watch. From the Valley of the Kings, the burning of Joan of Arc, the opening of the Clifton Suspension Bridge and the Battle of Bosworth Field, Max has to protect the timeline and if that means making a harsh decision. She knows she'll have to do it. If she doesn't History will. 
