This 13,000 word novelette takes place while Benjamin January is away from home (dealing with the events in [b:Good Man Friday|16043241|Good Man Friday (Benjamin January, #12)|Barbara Hambly|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1349924391s/16043241.jpg|21820478]). Rose is invited to a party, and, as is the way of things in books, the events of the evening don't just include music and dancing.

There is a fire at a neighbouring plantation, and the burned body of a white woman - the mistress of the plantation - is discovered. Her maid is blamed, and all the slaves on the plantation are at risk of being executed for complicity in the death. Naturally, Rose investigates.

It was good to see Rose on her own - I do like Ben, but it's nice for Rose to have her time in the sun. Hannibal also has a part to play, as does Lieutenant Shaw. For me, though, the character that really stole the show was Livia, Ben's mother. I know a lot of people don't like her, and you could see her as a straightforward gossip and crashing snob, but I see her as much more complex than that. In this little novelette, we get a tiny little window into Livia's world - the world of a woman who was a slave through the whole earlier part of her life, had to give up her husband and the father of her two children, and has finally "made it" to the upper echelons of New Orleans free-coloured society. Livia Levesque is neither stupid nor shallow, and this novelette shows that quite nicely. ( )