The Adventures of Mary Darling

Who is Mary Darling? In this subversive take on both Peter Pan and Sherlock Holmes, a daring mother is the populist hero the Victorian era never knew it needed.

“Pat Murphy illuminates the heroes we think we know and the stories we’re ready to swallow whole. She reveals powerful characters who’ve had to hide in plain sight while saving their world. The result is a rip-roaring tale of magic and mystery!”
—Andrea Hairston, author of Archangels of Funk

Mary Darling is a pretty wife whose boring husband is befuddled by her independent ways. But one fateful night, Mary becomes the distraught mother whose three children have gone missing from their beds.

After her well-meaning uncle John Watson contacts the greatest detective of his era (but perhaps not that great), Mary is Sherlock Holmes’s prime suspect in her children’s disappearance. To save her family, Mary must escape London—and an attempt to have her locked away as mad—to travel halfway around the world.

Despite the interference of Holmes, Mary gathers allies in her quest: Sam, a Solomon Islander whose village was destroyed by contact with Western civilization; Ruby, a Malagasy woman on an island that everyone thinks is run by pirates (though it’s actually run by women); Captain Hook and the crew of the Jolly Roger; and of course, Nana, the faithful dog and nursemaid.

In a witty and adventurous romp, The Adventures of Mary Darling draws on the histories of women and people indigenous to lands that Britain claimed, telling the stories of those who were ignored or misrepresented along the way.