Just as gothic as the earlier books, and there are (literally) a boatload of dead bodies by the time it's all over. Oddly enough, however, the recurring theme of the book is the ways that a parent will act out of love for a child, legitimate or out of wedlock. I did not see who the murderer was, but once I did, I mainly felt compassion.

John Donne has been one of my favorite poets since the first semester of college, so the fact that the solution to the murders relied on a Donne poem added depth to the book for me.