Dark Jenny is the third book in the Eddie LaCrosse series. It was released in 2011.
The book mostly consists of a large Flashback to a time before the first book (but with Eddie telling the story to his friends in the present as a Framing Device). Eddie was performing a minor job in the island kingdom of Grand Braun, and would mostly like to just leave again, but gets caught up in local intrigue when Queen Jennifer is accused of murder and adultery — with some saying that he himself was involved, to boot. Since the whole thing could easily turn to civil war, he's ordered to sort it out whether he likes it or not.
Dark Jenny provides examples of:
- Darker and Edgier: not that the series is exactly a sunlit meadow in springtime at the best of times, but the sheer scale of hearbreak and devastation that occurs over the course of the plot easily makes Dark Jenny the most harrowing installment
- Foregone Conclusion: Eddie's flashback of visiting Grand Braun shows it to be a beacon of civilisation and good government. However, the Framing Device which introduces that flashback tells us that in the present, Grand Braun is "primarily known as the site of the most vicious ongoing civil war in the world", and that "more than half its population had fled or been killed, and the land was overrun with invaders, mercenaries and pirates". As such, we know quite well that things are going to go downhill, and that Eddie will probably be involved somehow. Not to mention, if you were reading Burn Me Deadly carefully, you might remember a couple of throwaway references to Grand Braun and Dark Jenny.
- Foreshadowing: it's right there in the title. The main reason to have a name paired with an identifier - like say, 'dark' paired with 'jenny' is because there is more than one person by that name!
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Genius Bonus: given the Whole-Plot Reference (see below): if you've read Mercedes Lackey's book Gwenhwyfar, or are otherwise familiar with the Welsh tradition that King Arthur had more than one queen named Guinevere the twist that there are two Queen Jennifers might not be so shocking to you. - Whole-Plot Reference: The plot has extensive parallels to the story of King Arthur. Grand Braun is basically Britain (and its capital, Nodlon, is an anagram of London). Marcus Drake is Arthur; Elliot Spears is Lancelot. Belacrux is Excalibur (a near-anagram). There's a Merlin, a Morgan le Fay, and so forth. Perhaps the major difference is that there are secretly two Guineveres. Or not: see Genius Bonus above.
