Genre: Mystery
Hardcover; Trade Paperback; Digital Book
ISBN #: 9781683314332; 9781683319160
Crooked Lane Books
320 Pages
$17.61; $10.99; $9.99 Amazon
December 12, 2017 (Trade Published December 2018)
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Prospects are looking rosy for Taylor O'Brian, founder of "Off the Beaten Path" Wine Country Tours, who lives on a small winery with her Aunt Jemma and leads tours around romantic Sonoma County. At first blush, things are running smoothly, until a tour member is found dead - with Taylor's corkscrew buried in her neck.
Taylor has no nose for detective work, but as she begins to follow a trail of bottled-up secrets, evens take a sour new turn. Only two weeks after the murder, her assistant Amy marries Dan, the dead woman's husband, whose short-lived bereavement seems like a sham. And just as her investigation begins to take shape, Dan's sister turns up dead. Could Taylor be next on the list?
Now it's up to Taylor to uncork this open-bottle mystery before more blood is spilled.
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Taylor O'Brian returned to Sonoma County from San Francisco because her aunt, who owns a winery, needs help. She decided to open her own wine country tour company - Taylor O'Brian's "Off the Beaten Path" Wine Country Tours - in the hopes it will give her a decent income.
Her first tour group consists of her yoga instructor Laura, Laura's husband and several other people. But when returning to the van after a long hike, Laura is nowhere to be found. Both Dan and Taylor head in search of her, but it's Taylor who finds her down a ravine. When she and Dan reach Laura they call 911, but it's too late. Laura has been killed by a corkscrew to the next - Taylor's corkscrew - and no one even knows who did it.
While Dan thinks she's guilty, Taylor knows something is going on, especially when Dan remarries quickly and it looks as if the police have her pegged for the murder. Even though the sheriff warns her away from the crime, her aunt urges her to investigate, so she and her best friend Holly set out to find a killer before Taylor is put away for good...
This is the first book in a new series and I really wanted to like it, but I should have known when it was mentioned that Aunt Jemma was a little "hippy." I think the author meant 'hippie' which we all know what means, but 'hippy' means Aunt Jemma has a little too much flesh above the knees, if you get my drift...I know, nitpicking; but it was only a hint of what was to come, unfortunately.
Anyway, Taylor hires an attorney right away (who turns out to be a hunk, of course) because she's afraid the sheriff (another hunk) might have her pegged for the crime. Well, here we go, folks: another love triangle in the making. No surprise there...
So after she's been fingerprinted to eliminate her as a suspect, she takes a casserole to the grieving widower and he immediately accuses her of murdering his wife. Never mind that she was only alone with the body for a short time - not long enough to force her down a ravine, change into different clothes to stab the woman, change back (because the other clothes would have a lot of blood on them since she was stabbed in an artery) and then climb back up again - but hey - and then, leaving the man's home she's stopped by the police who got a call saying she was harassing Dan. Even when she shows the casserole, no dice. The cop outright asks her if she murdered Laura, although I don't know why. Was he there at the time of murder? Was it running through the police station that she was a 'person of interest' even though she was told by the sheriff she wasn't? How did this officer know her connection? He didn't mention that Dan said she murdered his wife, otherwise he would have put handcuffs on her. He said she was harassing him. How did one equate to the other? Why was he asking her if she killed Laura anyway? He's a patrolman. Shouldn't that be up to the homicide detectives, not him? Did he really think if she were guilty, that she'd randomly admit it? It sounds to me like the officer was harassing her. Details count.
Then her aunt actually encourages her to investigate, knowing there's a killer on the loose. I guess she doesn't think her niece could be the next one killed. Also, newspapers don't print the names of people of interest. It keeps them from being sued by injured parties. They wait until someone has been arrested.
As you can tell, I wasn't enthralled by this book. I really dislike love triangles (as it's looking to go that way). Look at it this way: if the protagonist were a man, and he was stringing along two women, people would think he was a slimeball. So why is it okay for two men to pursue one woman? And why would she do that to them? You'd think authors would know by now not to do this. Of course, I could be wrong and she might only be interested in one of them, but one of the last few scenes suggests otherwise...
At the end, I really didn't care who the murderer was. Taylor was dumber than a box of rocks. First she investigates because her aunt tells her to do it, even though her attorney (and the sheriff) tells her not to. She doesn't try to hide it. As you can read, I wasn't a fan of this book and I may or may not read the second in the hope it will improve, because it sure needs a lot of tweaking.
https://www.amazon.com/Case-Syrah-Wine-Country-Mystery/dp/1683314336/ref
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2120864820
More on Nancy J. Parra's Books: https://www.fantasticfiction.com/p/nancy-j-parra/
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