Wrap-Up of My Kind of Mystery 2017 Reading Challenge

I read 18 books for this challenge which had no required number of books for participants to read. I think that not having a reading goal was freeing for me and resulted in me reading more mysteries than if I was actively searching for mysteries.  The links to the reviews of the books that I read are below:

The Champagne Conspiracy
Coffin Road
The Seventh Plague
The Killing Ship
A Change of Heart
The Black Widow
The Lost Order
Runaway
The Obsidian Chamber
The Last Painting of Sara de Vos
Mercy
The Perplexing Theft of the Jewel in the Crown
The Prisoner
Use of Force
By Any Means

My favorite book:  Coffin Road.  You can't beat a Peter May mystery.

My least favorite book:  The Perplexing Theft of the Jewel in the Crown.  Boring!

By Any Means

I have read all of the books in this Ash Rashid detective series and loved them all.  By Any Means was published in 2014 so I am a little behind in my reading.

In this installment of the series Ash is no longer working as a detective for the Indianapolis Police Department but has been reassigned to the community relations department. He primarily gives speeches to schools. However, on his way home from work one day he finds a car accident.  Since no other officers are available, Ash is told to stay at the scene until an officer can arrive. Ash is unable to not investigate so he begins asking questions to those who were in the area when the accident happened. He determined that these responses do not add up and begins to investigate what he feels is a homicide.

As usual, author Chris Culver outdoes himself with his writing.  It is fast paced with plenty of twists and turns and there is a cliffhanger ending. I also love that his protagonist is an American Muslim, albeit not much of a practitioner of his faith.  Ash is an alcoholic. This is a welcome addition to American fiction and normalizes the viewpoint of Muslims in our society.

A great read!

Use of Force

Use of Force is Brad Thor's 12th Scot Harvath spy thriller. I have read every book that he has written and loved them all.

In this installment of the series main character Scot Harvath is able to prevent most parts of a terrorist attack in the U. S. He is then sent to Libya to pick up an ISIS operative. While he is trying to get to the terrorist, ISIS mounts escalating terrorist attacks in Europe, killing many.

One thing I love about Brad Thor's writing is that the mystery to be solved begins early in the book. This gives me the entire book to soak up the changing action and try to figure out clues to the denouement.

That said, I feel that Use of Force falls a little short.  While it is still a good novel, the writing is not up to par with Thor's earlier works. Thor admits that he changed his approach to writing with Use of Force. I am not sure what the change is but this novel was not as fast paced as all of his others. It does have the usual non-stop action though.

While I feel that Thor's writing falls short with this novel, because he was at the top of the thriller game, his writing is still heads above other thriller writers' abilities and I would still recommend the book to everyone. However, instead of giving a usual rating of 5 out of 5, Use of Force is 3.5 out of 5 because I was disappointed.

The Prisoner

The Prisoner is Alex Berenson's 12th novel and 11th John Wells spy thriller.  It is the first book of his that I have ever read.

The front cover blurb summarizes the book as follows:  "An Islamic State prisoner in a secret Bulgarian prison has been overheard hinting that a senior CIA officer may be passing information to the Islamic State. The agency's top officials, and even the President, say the possibility is unthinkable. But John Wells and Ellis Shafer, his former boss at the agency, have reason to believe it. To prove their fears, Wells will have to reassume his former identity as a hardened jihadi, then get  captured and sent to the same prison as the source..."

I enjoyed this book somewhat but was disappointed that the main story did not commence until halfway through the book.  It took me over a week to read it which for me is a long time.  I usually finish a book in 1 or 2 days.

The pace was slow which made it a boring book. I know that this is a minority opinion as I have read many glowing reviews of the book. It just did not do much for me.

The Perplexing Theft of the Jewel in the Crown

The Perplexing Theft of the Jewel in the Crown is the 2nd installment of the Baby Ganesh Agency Investigation series by Vaseem Khan. The not-so-amateur sleuth is retired police investigator Ashwin Chopra who lives in Mumbai. Inspector Chopra has a pet baby elephant that he takes with him everywhere, having bought a special van to drive the animal around in. The elephant, named Ganesha, has intelligent and emotional features similar to a human, at least in Inspector Chopra's eyes.

The story begins with the opening of an exhibition of the British Crown Jewels at the Prince of Wales Museum in Mumbai. The Queen is also in India on tour. Chopra manages to obtain tickets for the first day of the exhibition for himself and his wife Poppy.  The main treasure of the exhibition is the Queen's crown with its Koh-i-Noor diamond. The diamond was given to Queen Victoria from India, via its British masters, and many Indians feel that it should remain in India. While Chopra is gazing at the crown he hears several loud noises and smoke engulfs the room.  When he regains consciousness, the crown is gone.

The Force One guards investigating the theft quickly find the perpetrator, police Inspector Shekhar Garewal, after finding the crown in his home, minus the Koh-i-Noor diamond. Chopra is asked by Inspector Garewal to help him clear his name as he is innocent of the theft.

I enjoyed the first half of the book but got bored when Inspector Chopra's investigation began and I started skipping pages. The characters did not appeal to me.  Chopra's wife Poppy seemed to be interesting but she had a minor role in the plot. Also, I had a hard time recognizing the pet elephant's role. Let's face it, the suspension of belief required to believe that an elephant can contribute to an investigation is too far to go. While the book is advertised as a mystery I would categorize it further as a cozy mystery.

Since I liked half of the book I will give it 2.5 stars.

Mercy

Mercy was written by Dan Palmer, the son of medical mystery author Michael Palmer who died a year or two ago.  I don't know if Mercy was an unfinished manuscript by Michael or whether his son is going to continue to write medical mysteries in his memory.  Either way, I am glad that there is someone still interested in writing medical mysteries. It is my favorite mystery sub-genre. With the death of Michael Palmer and Robin Cook no longer writing there currently isn't anyone specializing in this sub-genre.

The topic of Mercy is the critically ill patient's right to die with dignity.  In the novel's White Memorial Hospital expensive, critically ill patients mysteriously die of heart attacks even though none of them have heart disease. It saves the hospital a bundle of money but how is it happening and who is involved?

ICU doctor Julie Devereaux is an outspoken advocate for a patient's right to die until her fiance becomes a paraplegic from a motorcycle accident. He dies of an unexpected heart attack. His autopsy reveals an unusual heart defect, one that is only seen in people under extreme stress.  Since the defect disappears when the stress is alleviated it is not seen as a fatal disease.  Julie investigates similar cases and finds herself the target of threats, even to the point of being accused of a mercy killing herself.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. It was quite relaxing to read a book that I knew I would like because of its genre.  I also knew that any book written by the Palmers will have great characters, excellent pacing, and suspense.  They have the writing gene.  Mercy was somewhat bittersweet due to personal circumstances that have put me in the hospital several times over the past 2 months.  I have been subjected to nurses yelling at me for not having a living will and they let it be known that they wanted me to sign a DNR (do not rescesitate order).  Being stubborn I refused.  But the beginning of the book was too real for me and made me a little paranoid.  However, it has a compelling plot and excellent writing and I highly recommend it.

The Last Painting of Sara de Vos

This is the first book of Dominic Smith's that I have read and it was fabulous.  The Last Painting of Sara de Vos is part mystery and part historical fiction.  The book alternates between the 17th century, the 1950s and year 2000.

The back cover blurb summarizes the book as follows:  "Amsterdam, 1631: Sara de Vos, the first female master painter in the Guild of St. Luke, defies convention by painting a haunting landscape. New York City, 1957: Her only known surviving work, At the Edge of a Wood, hangs in the bedroom of a wealthy lawyer descended from the original owner. Ellie Shipley, a struggling art history student, paints a forgery for an art dealer. Sydney, 2000:  Now a celebrated art historian and curator, Ellie mounts an exhibit of female Dutch painters and finds that both versions are en route to her museum."

Loved, loved, loved this book.  Each era depicts women artists in the male dominated art world.  There was alot of information on art history, art restoration and forgeries which I found to be exciting.  Of course, there is also alot of information about Dutch painters of the 17th century.  The author was well researched in these areas.

All of the characters were appealing, especially Sara.  I enjoyed reading about her life even though the author created her from a composite of real Dutch female painters.  She seemed real to me and I felt that I had known her.  Another great feature was that there were at least 3 strong female characters, remarkable in a book written by a man and done so well.

This book is a must read.

The Obsidian Chamber

The inside cover blurb summarizes the book as follows:

"After a harrowing, otherworldly confrontation in Exmouth, Massachusetts, Special Agent A. X. L. Prendergast is missing, presumed dead. Sick with grief, Pendergast's ward, Constance, retreats to her chambers beneath the family mansion at 891 Riverside Drive-only to be taken captive by a shadowy figure from the past. Proctor, Pendergast's longtime bodyguard, springs to action, chasing Constance's kidnappers through cities, across oceans and into wastelands unknown.  And by the time Proctor discovers the truth, a terrifying engine has stirred-and it may already be too late."

The Obsidian Chamber is the 16th Special Agent Pendergast mystery.  I have only read one other book in the series, Blue Labyrinth and my lack of knowledge about the series definitely affected how I felt about the book. I felt that it was a little slow.  There is alot of back story written into the novel which I needed to know to understand what was happening, but it made the reading less suspenseful for me.  The book is described as a thriller by the publisher but I did not feel any thrill.  The plot was definitely interesting but because half of the book was back story, it fell a little flat to me.  

Runaway

I had a hard time getting into this novel but after the first 50 pages I became interested. The story alternates between events that occurred in 1965 and the present time.  I liked the 1965 story better but it ended with the present and all the loose ends were wrapped up.

The story opens in 2015 with 4 childhood friends getting reacquainted. The story then goes back to 1965 with 5 teenage friends running away from their homes in Glasgow for London with hopes of making it big in the music industry. Guitarist Jack Mackay makes the decision to leave after being expelled from high school and his bandmates decide that they don't really want to stay home either. Luke is tired of going door to door with his Jehovah Witnesses parents, keyboard player Maurie wants to give up the opera lessons his parents have forced him into taking , drummer Jeff is a school dropout selling cars and bass player Dave just wants to leave. They lose all their money from a fellow traveler who takes advantage of them and upon arrival they are taken advantage of again by a man who says he can get them a demo record that they can market to an agent.  While they are in London a new friend is killed. When the group are seniors they decide to retrace their steps in London.  Maurie gathers the group together telling them that he has something to finish in London that got started all those years ago.  With Jack's grandson as the driver they set off for London.

While this was a good book it was not as good as earlier May novels.  The plot was simpler and the characters were less developed.   It just wasn't as interesting as the usual Peter May novel.

3 out of 5 stars.

The Lost Order

The Lost Order is Steve Berry's 12th Cotton Malone mystery and his 16th book to date.

Cotton accepts an assignment from the Smithsonian Institution and travels to Arkansas to locate a lost treasure.  He becomes involved with the remnant of the most powerful group in American history-the Knights of the Golden Circle. The Knights were founded in 1854 and disappeared in the early 20th century. The KKK was an off-shoot of the group. However, there are now only about 550 sentinals of the Knights that are rumored to be guarding billions of dollars worth of Confederate gold.  The Smithsonian is not government funded and would like to have the gold to finance their museums. The only problem is that the treasure can only be found by locating 5 stones with clues to the location of the treasure.  All of the clues have been encrypted in a code that has been unbreakable for 150 years. Cotton travels from Washington, DC to Arkansas and then to New Mexico to solve the code and locate the treasure.

There is a subplot about the Speaker of the House of Representatives putting a group of Reprentatives from the House Rules Committee to make a change in their rules that the House will only vote on legislation that originated in the House.  This makes the Senate powerless. Some elected officials want to push this rule through while others want to make this change by holding a second Constitutional Convention and write a new Constitution that 3/4ths of the states will have to ratify.  The idea for the rule change originated in the Confederate Constitution.  Most of the Knights were Confederate supporters. Who wins?  You have to read the book to find out.

The Lost Order was an interesting read.  I learned alot about our country's history from the Writer's Note at the end of the book wherein he explained which parts of the story were true and which parts he created in his mind.

Cotton's family history is central to the story and that added to his character growth.  Angus "Cotton" Adams, a Confederate spy, holds the key to everything needed to resolve this hunt for treasure.

While I loved the historical facts surrounding the plot, this installment of the series was not as compelling as earlier books in the series.  The earlier books were page turners but this one had a slower pace.  However, I would give it 4 out of 5 stars.

The Black Widow

I am a big fan of Dan Silva and The Black Widow is his 19th novel in the Gabriel Allon spy series.  The Black Widow begins with master spy Gabriel Allon putting off becoming chief of Israel's intelligence service in order to do one more operation.  ISIS agents have attacked France's Jews and killed Allon's friend Hannah Weisberg.  The man running ISIS has taken the name Saladin and Allon has decided to put a live agent in the caliphate in order to destroy it.  He recruits a young female doctor for the job who will pose as a possible ISIS recruit.  She will be a black widow - a woman who becomes radicalized after losing her boyfriend to an attack from the West.  The recruit will travel from Israel to Paris to Greece then to Raqqa and eventually to Washington DC while performing her mission.

The Black Widow is one of my favorite installments of the series.  Here we get to see how a spy is recruited and trained. Also, Allon's personal life has changed as he now has two kids and he is beginning to see how his life will change when he becomes the head of the Office, as the intelligence service is called in the series. These are interesting character developments which we don't get to see too often.  Our Gabriel Allon is moving on with his life.

This book is a thriller writer's thriller. There was so much suspense that it kept me reading until I finished its 500+ pages in one Sunday morning.  It has been a long time since I have had the luxury of reading a thriller this good.

If you have never read a book in this series I highly recommend that you give it a chance.  They all move fast and have a good balance between exposition, rising tensions, and action.  I doubt that you would be disappointed.

The Last Chance Olive Ranch

The Last Chance Olive Ranch is Susan Wittig Albert's 25th China Bayles cozy mystery.  In this installment of the series there are two separate plots which are unrelated to each other.  China Bayles and her business partner Ruby Wilcox are scheduled to teach a workshop at the Last Chance Olive Ranch the next day. However, China's husband and ex-cop McQuaid gets a phone call advising that a killer he put on death row has escaped and has killed 2 people already.  He suspects that he is on the killer's list of people to exact revenge from.  China does not want to go to the workshop so that she can stay home and keep her husband safe.  However, she is talked into going and finds herself involved in a dangerous matter at the ranch where 2 characters battle for ownership of the ranch.

I have read the entire China Bayles series and this is the first time that China's activities and those of her husband were not related to the same plot.  I did not feel that it took anything away from the story though.  I know and love all of the characters in the series and they are strong enough to carry separate plots on their own.  Both plots were complex and interesting.

When you love a series you come to love the characters.  The sad part about finishing a book is that you have to wait another year before the author can write and publish the next book and separation anxiety sets in.  That just shows the strength of the series though.

The Last Chance Olive Ranch has alot of information on the almighty olive which was fun to read about.  There is also some suspense with the chapters alternating between China's story and McQuaid's story.  All in all, this was another great read from Susan Wittig Albert.

The Empress of Tempera

The Empress of Tempera by Alex Dolan begins with protagonist Paire Anjou watching a man stab himself to death after sobbing in front of a painting in the window of the Fern Gallery where she works.  The  Empress Xiao Zhe Yi, Seated was painted on wood with tempera paint by an artist named Qi and was on loan from an unknown source.  Paire, while being in shock from watching a man kill himself, was surprised to see the painting in the gallery as the gallery was hosting an exhibition of works by her boyfriend Derek Rosewood.  Hundreds of people from all over the world come to the gallery and obsess over the Empress's stare and clothing, including Paire.  The painting is stolen, stolen again and stolen a third time as Paire researches the painting and the artist's histories.  She sets in motion a plethora of crimes by others as they bribe, steal and kill in order to possess the painting.

The story shows the dark underside of the art world. It is also about art history and the family secrets of those who are trying to possess the painting.  Paire's own family background is a part of the story which was interesting to read about.  Nobody seems to be whom they say they are which gave the novel a lot of suspense.  The plot was complex with many twists and turns.

I loved this second novel by Mr. Dolan.  He is a new author for me and I will be following him in the future.

Salem's Cipher

Salem's Cipher is Jess Lourey's debut novel and it is a fabulous start to what I hope will be a long writing career.  I loved this book which I believe is going to be a series with Salem Wiley as the main character. She is a cryptanalyst, able to decipher codes.

The story opens with the mothers of Salem and her best friend Isabel "Bel" Odegaard being kidnapped.  The mothers were also best friends and Salem and Bel grew up together.  After being contacted by the police about the crime the two of them meet at the scene of the crime where Salem finds a note that her mother wrote years ago.   The note was hidden in a wooden box that Salem had made for her when she was a child.  The note references a Dr. Keller who is a curator at a local museum and gives them a clue to look at a painting by Artemisia Gentileschi called Judith Slaying Holofernes.  After examining the painting Salem finds some words written deep within the painting.  Dr. Keller is vague about how he knows the mothers but gives them enough clues to send them off to Salem, Massachusetts in a search for the truth about what the mothers were up to.  As Salem and Bel follow numerous word and number puzzles they are led to travel  cross country all while being followed by men who are trying to kill them.

This was a wonderful story.  The puzzles that the women, in particular Salem, had to solve were difficult.  I had no idea how they were going to be figured out.  As an aside, the truth of the story involved the first woman presidential candidate just days before the General Election.  This added a nice element. Also, it is always great to see a novel with alot of strong female characters.  There are 5 here so you know the book was written by a woman.

Simply fabulous!

A Change of Heart

This is the first book of Sonali Dev's that I have read. Unfortunately, I was disappointed with the book.  I just could not get into it.

The back cover blurb summarizes the story "Dr. Nikhil 'Nic' Joshi had it all - marriage, career, purpose.  Until, while working with Doctors Without Borders, in a Mumbai slum with his wife, Jen, discovers a black market organ transplant ring.  Before she could expose the truth, Jen was killed.

Two years after the tragedy Nic is a cruise ship doctor who spends his days treating seasickness and sunburn and his nights in a boozy haze.  On one of those blurry evenings on deck, Nic meets a woman who makes a startling claim:  she received Jen's heart in a transplant and has a message for him.  Nic wants to discount Jess Koirala's story as absurd, but there's something about her reckless desperation that resonates despite his doubts.

Jess has spent years working her way out if a nightmarish life in Calcutta and into a respectable Bollywood dance troupe. Now she faces losing the one thing that matters - her young son Joy.  She needs to uncover the secrets Jen risked everything for; but the unforeseen bond that results between her and Nic is both a lifeline and a perilous complication"

After reading 100 pages I did not know any of the above other than that Nic was an alcoholic cruise ship doctor.  So, I stopped reading.  My rule is that if I cannot get hooked after reading 50-100 pages, I put it down.  Alot of verbage was wasted on descriptions of Nic's alcoholic state which did not interest me and I did not see anything developing in the story. Better luck with the next book.

The Killing Ship

This is my first time reading Simon Beaufort and I was not disappointed. The Killing Ship is a short novel with only 217 pages but alot of action is packed into its pages.  It takes place in Antarctica where a group of scientists are spending the summer doing research.

With 10 days left to finish their research, marine biologist Andrew Barrister turns down a request from his co-workers to take a long hike to view the scenery on Antarctica's remote Livingstone Island. No one is supposed to leave the station on their own due to hazardous conditions.  However, a few leave but do not return.  No one knows if they were together or went out on their own.  A crew is dispatched to look for them but one hears gunshots and another sees a ship.  It is too late in the season for ships to be in the region so it is a suspicious arrival.  Then one of the scientists discovers that their food and supplies have been sabotaged and there is not enough food to go around until their rescue ship comes to pick them up.  As they leave the station to search for their crew members the scientists run into killers on the island who are pursuing them for reasons unknown.

I loved this story.  It was very fast paced and suspenseful.  The ending was surprising and a little shocking too. Psychological thrillers are my favorite mystery subgenre for a reason.  They are engrossing with each chapter ending with suspense and characters who are so shocked by their circumstances that they begin to lose reality.  The Killing Ship aptly fits the bill.  Highly recommended!

The Seventh Plague

I am a fan of James Rollins' Sigma Force novels.  The Seventh Plague is his 18th novel in the series and his 23rd novel to date.  The inside front cover blurb summarizes the novel as follows:

"Two years after vanishing into the Sudanese desert, the leader of a British archeological expedition, Professor Harold McCabe, comes stumbling out of the sands, frantic and delirious, but he dies before he can tell his story.  The mystery deepens when an autopsy uncovers a bizarre corruption: someone has begun to mummify the professor's body-while he was still alive.

His strange remains are returned to London for further study, when alarming news arrives from Egypt.  The medical team that had performed the man's autopsy has fallen ill with an unknown disease, one that is quickly spreading throughout Cairo.  Fearing the worst, a colleague of the professor reaches out to a longtime friend: Painter Crowe, the director of Sigma Force.  The call is urgent, for Professor McCabe had vanished into the desert while searching for proof of the ten plagues of Moses.  As the pandemic grows, a disturbing question arises:  Are those plagues starting again?

Before Director Crowe can investigate, a mysterious group of assassins leaves behind a fiery wake of destruction and death, erasing all evidence.  With the professor's body incinerated, his home firebombed, Sigma Force must turn to the archeologist's only daughter, Jane McCabe, for help.  While sifting through what's left of her father's work, she discovers a puzzling connection tying the current threat to a shocking historical mystery, one involving the travels of Mark Twain, the genius of Nikola Tesla, and the adventures of famous explorer Henry Morgan Stanley.

To unravel a secret going back millennia, Director Crowe and Commander Grayson Pierce will be thrust to opposite sides of the globe.  One will search for the truth, traveling to the plague ridden streets of Cairo to a vast ancient tomb buried under the burning sands of the Sudan; the other will struggle to stop a mad genius locked within a remote Arctic engineering complex, risking the lives of all those he holds dear.

As the global crisis grows even larger, Sigma Force will confront a threat born of the ancient past and made real by the latest science-a danger that will unleash cascading series of plagues, culminating in a scourge that could kill all of the world's children. . . decimating humankind forever."

I expected alot from this story but was disappointed.  I found myself skipping pages because I was only interested in the part about the ancient past.  This was not a thriller for me at all.  First of all, this is not your typical Sigma Force novel.  Some of the series' dominant characters had small roles and the storyline was not a usual Sigma Force plot.  Second, the subplot involving the assassins did not fit well with the rest of the story and neither did the subplot about the genius in the Arctic. I think the author should have stuck with the main plot and run with it.

Very disappointed as James Rollins is one of my favorite authors.

Coffin Road

I had already read Peter May's Enzo Files series when I saw this book at the library. I was hoping it would be another Enzo File novel but it was not.  It is better. Coffin Road is the best novel that I have read in a long time.  It had me spell bound and I could not put it down.

The story takes place on the Isle of Harris in Scotland's Outer Hebrides. The setting is central to the story.  The characters react to the flora and fauna of the scenery and the stormy weather patterns are part of the plot.  Since the author is a Scotsman he is an expert on the geography of this location.

The main character washes ashore on a beach on the Isle of Harris with amnesia. He has no idea who he is or why he is on the island.  He learns a few things about himself from other characters, including where he is living and eventually his name, but begins a search into his identity after finding a map of the island that leads to a path called Coffin Road. He feels led to this part of the island and begins his search there.

A rebellious teenager Karen Fleming stops attending school after her mother decides to let her boyfriend move in.  She feels her mother is betraying her father who has been dead for 2 years and determines to find out more about him.

Homicide detective George Gunn travels to a remote island to investigate the death of a man in an abandoned lighthouse where a century earlier 3 lighthouse keepers disappeared.

The stories of these 3 characters merge together in a tightly woven plot.  There is a lot of suspense in this book which turned out to be an eco-thriller.  I was not expecting the story to go there but it added an interesting aspect to the plot. An amazing read.  Highly recommended!

My Kind of Mystery 2017 Reading Challenge

I am joining this challenge which runs from February 1, 2017 through January 31, 2018.  There does not appear to be any rules for the challenge so I assume you can read any number of books in any sub-genre of the mystery genre.  I sort of like a challenge with no required number of books.  It makes me feel more relaxed knowing I don't have to push myself to read x number of books per month.

The Champagne Conspiracy

I read Ellen Crosby's The Champagne Conspiracy for the Craving for Cozies Reading Challenge.  This book is the 7th installment of the wine country mystery series. The author took a break from the series a few years ago so I was pleased to find this book in the library last week.

The main character is Lucie Montgomery, a disabled vineyard owner in Virginia. Her winemaker/boyfriend is Quinn Santorini and together they have decided to create a sparkling wine.  This aspect of the book takes a second seat to the family history of Quinn.  Quinn's California cousin Gino Tomassi arrives at the vineyard to find out who is blackmailing him over what happened to his grandfather's first wife Zara Tomassi. Zara died in 1923, the day after President Warren Harding died in California while on his way back home from a trip to Alaska.  Amateur sleuth Lucie delves into the Tomassi family history to help Gino get answers.  She finds the story begins in Prohibition era Washington, DC, travels across the pond to England and ends in California.

There were several subplots that made the plot a little confusing.  However, I loved getting to know the characters again and the subplots did all come together at the end.  The pace was fast and there were some interesting historical facts blended into the story which made it a fun read.  Of course, there was alot of information on the wine making process which I loved reading about.

Highly recommended!