Overkill
An
Emma Streat Mystery
Eugenia Lovett West
St.
Martin's Minotaur (Hardcover)
ISBN-10: 0-312-37114-4 (0312371144)
ISBN-13: 978-0-312-37114-2 (9780312371142)
Publication Date: November 2009
List Price: $25.99
Synopsis (from
the publisher): Emma Streat is rebuilding her shattered life in Boston
when she receives an SOS from Venice. She must come at once to
intervene in a disastrous affair between her opera singer niece,
Vanessa, and a notorious playboy. But the night Emma and Vanessa return
home, Vanessa is struck down by what appears to be the first case of
avian flu in the United States.
Suddenly Emma is forced to cope with the medical world. As the case
assumes a larger, international aspect, she finds herself working again
with a charismatic British peer. Will their unusual relationship
survive Emma’s new interest in a brilliant doctor?
After two shocking murders, Emma has to rev up her now-established
talent for making unlikely connections, in order to smoke out a lethal
global network that sells stolen viruses—and save herself
from a painful and horrifying death.
Review:
Former opera singer Emma Streat is having trouble dealing with her
recent past -- the murder of her husband, the loss of her singing voice
when a fire bomb destroyed her home, even not being a "hands-on" mom
when her sons go off to college -- when she receives a call from Venice
asking for her help in Overkill,
the second mystery in this series by Eugenia Lovett West.
Cathy Riordan, an assistant to Emma's niece Vanessa Metcalf, pleads
with Emma to immediately travel to Italy. Vanessa, a promising opera
diva, intends to quit her vocation and run off with a man she just met
following her next -- and final -- performance. Seth Barbazaolan is
handsome and rich, and has promised Vanessa a life of leisure and
happiness. Emma flies to Venice to discuss the matter with her niece,
but soon after her arrival, Cathy's accompanist is found dead, hung
with a drapery cord in Vanessa's suite, an apparent suicide. In the
wake of this tragedy, Emma insists Vanessa and Cathy return with her to
Boston, reasoning that her niece can always catch up with Seth in
Sardinia later. But after arriving in the US, Vanessa suddenly becomes
deathly ill. At the hospital, tests suggest she has acquired a virus of
some kind -- and officials fear it may be the avian flu, the first such
case in the US. Emma calls on Lord Andrew Rodale for help, a man who
first worked with her in solving her husband's murder, and together
they uncover an international organization that trafficks in deadly
viruses.
The synopsis of Overkill
suggests this mystery may be complicated and overworked, a plot with
too many disparate elements, but nothing could be further from the
truth. It's more like a grand puzzle, engaging the reader to put the
pieces together with Emma Streat. Emma herself is a delightful amateur
sleuth, a capable, determined woman, who has faced recent hardship but
is unwilling to let that stop her from protecting her family, even if
she doesn't quite know what that may entail. This fast-paced,
thrilling, really rather sophisticated read will almost certainly be
remembered as one of the best mysteries of the year.
Special thanks to guest reviewer Betty of The Betz Review for contributing her review of Overkill and to St. Martin's Minotaur for providing a copy of the book for this review.
Review Copyright © 2010 — Hidden Staircase Mystery Books — All Rights Reserved
Have you read Overkill? How would you rate it?
Mysteries in this series …
Without
Warning
St. Martin's Minotaur (Hardcover), November 2007
ISBN-10: 0-312-37113-6 (0312371136)
ISBN-13: 978-0-312-37113-5 (9780312371135)
Overkill
St. Martin's Minotaur (Hardcover), November 2009
ISBN-10: 0-312-37114-4 (0312371144)
ISBN-13: 978-0-312-37114-2 (9780312371142)
Omnimystery
keywords for Overkill
...
Location(s) referenced: Venice,
Italy, Boston,
Massachusetts.
