On a freezing, windswept day in the Scottish Hebrides, Eleanor Bruton's body is discovered on the shore. To her family Eleanor was an ordinary middle-aged woman, with a skill for flower arrangements and plumping kneeler cushions at church. Little did they know she was harbouring a dark and all-consuming secret: a scrap of fraying embroidery that seemed worthless at first glance.

For over a century two rival organisations of women have gone to deadly lengths to secure the valuable artefact in the hopes of finding the original medieval manuscript from which it was torn. The Order of St Katherine: devoted to the belief that women must pull strings in the shadows in order to exercise covert control. And the Fellowship of The Larks: determined to amass as many overt positions of power for women as possible . . . while making sure their methods of doing so never come to light.

When renowned expert Dr Anya Brown is handpicked by the exclusive Institute of Manuscript Studies at St Andrews, she is unaware that she's been recruited - at her own peril - to translate ancient texts that the Larks believe critical to their mission. Meanwhile, at Scotland Yard, Detective Clio Spicer begins a secret investigation into the death of Eleanor Bruton.

As Dr Brown and Detective Spicer become entangled in this ancient web, circumstances spin wildly out of control. Will the battle to advance the rights and power of womankind bring their lives into grave danger?

The Burning Library whisks the listener away on an exhilarating chase from the academic cloisters of Oxford, Cambridge and St Andrews to the ancient medieval Italian city of Verona.