Friday, January 16, 2015

Quicksand (A Jaya Jones Treasure Hunt Mystery #3)

Author:  Gigi Pandian
Genre:  Mystery

Five Stars
A thousand-year-old secret room. A sultan’s stolen treasure. A missing French priest. And an invitation to Paris to rekindle an old flame....
Historian Jaya Jones finds herself on the wrong side of the law during an art heist at the Louvre. To redeem herself, she follows clues from an illuminated manuscript that lead from the cobblestone streets of Paris to the quicksand-surrounded fortress of Mont Saint-Michel. With the help of enigmatic Lane Peters and a 90-year-old stage magician, Jaya delves into France's colonial past in India to clear her name and catch a killer.

********

When Jaya Jones, historian at a university in San Francisco, receives a first-class ticket and hotel reservation at an upscale property in Paris from her sometime-boyfriend Lane Peters, she hops on a plane to visit him.  When she arrives at the hotel, she finds Lane didn't send the ticket, and didn't know she was coming.  It was a ruse to get her there, because Lane has been recruited for an art heist from the Louvre, and Jaya is insurance that he'll do the job...

Once Jaya has resigned herself to what is happening, things begin to go horribly awry.  When someone who was supposed to help can't be reached, Jaya is reluctantly recruited to take over.  When the theft is complete, Jaya also sees something she's not supposed to, and realizes there is something more going on, something she isn't supposed to find out.

I must say that I enjoyed this book immensely, partly because I enjoy mysteries, and partly because I love history.  The author weaves fact with fiction in such a way that it all seems believable, and that is exactly what a book is supposed to do.  I really don't want to say much more about the plot, because I want everyone who reads it to find out what's happening at the same time as Jaya, and that will only occur if they read themselves.  But I do want to tell you that it is an excellent mystery with enough twists to keep even the most seasoned mystery buff interested.  For myself, I was interested in the imagery of the abbey, and the persona of Sebastien, whom I found delightful.  Highly recommended.  This book will be released in March 2015.

No comments:

Post a Comment

A Spicy Side of Homicide (An Ivy Creek Mystery Book 14)

Author:      Ruth Baker Genre:       Mystery Digital Book  ASIN #:     B0CPVY5PKY Clean Tales Publishing 138 Pages $2.99 Amazon May 31, 2024...