London, 1679-A year has passed since the attempt to murder King Charles II, but London is still a viper's nest of rumored Catholic conspiracies, and of plots against them in turn. When Harry Hunt-estranged from his mentor Robert Hooke-is summoned to the remote and windswept marshes of Norfolk, he is at first relieved to get away from the place.But in Norfolk, he finds that some Royal workers shoring up a riverbank have made a grim discovery-the skeleton of a dwarf. Harry is able to confirm that the skeleton is that of Captain Jeffrey Hudson, a prominent member of the court once famously given to the Queen in a pie. Except no one knew Hudson was dead, because another man had been impersonating him.The hunt for the impersonator, clearly working as a spy, will take Harry to Paris, another city bedeviled by conspiracies and intrigues, and back, with encounters along the way with a flying man and a cross-dressing swordswoman-and to the uncovering of a plot to kill the Queen and all the Catholic members of her court. But where? When?The Poison Machine is a brilliantly imagined historical thriller that will delight readers of its critically acclaimed predecessor, The Bloodless Boy.