King gripped by novel about woman in service (4)
I believe the answer is:
wren
'woman in service' is the definition.
'Wren' can be an answer for 'woman'. I'm not certain of the 'in service' bit.
'king gripped by novel about' is the wordplay.
'king' becomes 'r' (r is abbreviation for rex).
'gripped by' indicates putting letters inside.
'novel' becomes 'new' (synonyms).
'about' is a reversal indicator.
'r' placed into 'new' is 'nerw'.
'nerw' in reverse letter order is 'WREN'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for wren that I've seen before include "Small active brown northern hemisphere bird" , "Tiny bird" , "Very small brown songbird (4)" , "Troglodytes troglodytes" , "18 [SWAN] 's little cousin" .)