Monthly Book Recommendations: July 2002 Recommendations

» terann - July 2002 Recommendations

• The Etruscan Chimera by Lyn Hamilton (Lara McClintoch series #6), Berkley Prime Crime, 2002 - Lara McClintoch, Toronto antiques shop owner, receives a commission from reclusive billionaire Crawford Lake to buy an Etruscan sculpture, with the condition that he remain anonymous in the deal. Lake directs Lara to the sculpture's owner but when Lara gets there she finds the owner dead--and an Etruscan artifact is missing from his collection. As Lara begins her car trip to meet up with Lake in Italy, she is startled to find the missing artifact in the trunk of her car. And so begins a dangerous game of hide-and-seek--with Lara hiding from the police while she tries to seek out the elusive Mr. Lake so that he may return the artifact.
  
• Death of a Damn Yankee by Toni L.P. Kelner (Laura Fleming series #6), 1999 - To the folks of Byerly, carpetbaggers rank right up there in popularity with death and taxes. So when Northerners Marshall and Grace Saunders try to buy out the town's largest mill, it's no shock the proposed sale nearly causes a second Civil War. But Laura Fleming is surprised when the mill's president, Burt Walters, confidentially asks her to muckrake through the Saunders' backgrounds, even though Big Bill Walters, Burt's dad, the controlling owner of the mill, wants to sell. So with her Shakespeare professor husband Richard in tow, Laura knows the best place to start her investigation is with her own family, the Burnettes. Visiting her gossipy aunts Nora, Edna, and Maggie, Laura not only learns of how divided mill workers are on the rumored sale, but of a suspicious string of fires that have been plaguing the town. Matters grow even more complicated when the Byerly fire brigade pulls Marshall Saunders' body from a burning barn, and police name Laura's cousin Linwood as the number one suspect. It's only when Laura uncovers explosive data from the mill that she reasons the arsons may be more than just a twisted pyromaniac at work. But time is running out, and if she and Richard don't untangle the myriad of deceptions surrounding a small city of suspects, the mill--and their lives--may soon go up in smoke.
  

-- posted by terann