Etched in Tears

October 1, 2017
An amateur sleuth investigates the death of a high school sweetheart.Savannah Webb is doubly delighted to be accompanying her boyfriend, Florida restaurateur Edward Morris, to the Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida, to see an exhibit of glasswork. After all, the artist, Dennis Lansing, is her former boyfriend and one of the first alumni of an apprentice program her late father helped run for troubled kids. Their romance was nipped in the bud by two inconvenient truths: Dennis was three years older than Savannah, and he'd been involved in selling drugs before he entered the program. At the opening, she and Edward meet state representative Charles King, another of Dennis' high school friends, along with Dennis' attractive wife, Harriet. She barely has time to talk to them before they're rudely dragged off by the museum director to meet some politically prominent guests. So she's shocked when Dennis is found dead at the museum and Officer Joy Williams asks her to consult on the case. No stranger to sleuthing (Cracked to Death, 2016), Savannah's anxious to help, especially when a letter written by her deceased father refusing to recommend someone named Chase for a job is found in Dennis' pocket. She agrees to go through her father's old files only to find they're encrypted and that the skills her cautious father taught her aren't enough to crack his codes. Luckily, a wonderful young man working for her is especially talented at solving puzzles despite his autism. While he works on the encryptions, Savannah and the police follow up other clues, alibis, and red herrings in their search for a killer.A middling mystery with a touch of romance and some interesting tips on glassmaking.

COPYRIGHT(2017) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.