Nightshade (China Bayles Series #16)

by Susan Wittig Albert

Overview

China’s still reeling from her father’s death and has no interest in her halfbrother Miles’s investigation. But when fate forces her to get involved, China realizes it’s time to bring the past to light—or else it will haunt her forever. Then she discovers that Miles may be keeping secrets himself. How deep do the layers of secrecy go? And who has a stake in concealing a long-buried truth? Now, one fresh murder and several cold cases will force China Bayles to face her dark past.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781101207819
Publisher:	Penguin Publishing Group
Publication date:	04/01/2008
Series:	China Bayles Series , #16
Sold by:	Penguin Group
Format:	eBook
Pages:	304
Sales rank:	74,786
File size:	388 KB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Susan Wittig Albert grew up on a farm in Illinois and earned her Ph.D. at the University of California at Berkeley. A former professor of English and a university administrator and vice president, she is the author of the China Bayles Mysteries, the Darling Dahlias Mysteries, and the Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter. Some of her recent titles include Widow’s Tears, Cat’s Claw, The Darling Dahlias and the Confederate Rose, and The Tale of Castle Cottage. She and her husband, Bill, coauthor a series of Victorian-Edwardian mysteries under the name Robin Paige, which includes such titles as Death at Glamis Castle and Death at Whitechapel.

Date of Birth:

1940

Place of Birth:

Danville, Illinois

Education:

Ph.D., University of California at Berkeley

Editorial Reviews

Former attorney China Bayles, now the proprietor of a small herb shop in Pecan Springs, Tex., finally gets some answers to her questions about the death of her cold, distant father, who perished in a fiery car accident 16 years earlier, in the satisfying conclusion to a trilogy that began with Bleeding Hearts and Spanish Dagger, the preceding two books within Albert's long-running cozy series. When China's half-brother, Miles, hires China's husband, Mike McQuaid, a former homicide officer struggling to establish himself as a PI, to investigate the fatal crash, China isn't sure this is a good idea. Her reservations prove well founded after the secretive Miles turns out to have his own agenda. Fans will be pleased that by supplementing China's usual first-person narration with McQuaid's third-person perspective, Albert casts fresh light on his character and his relationship with China. Snippets of plant lore, mostly to do with the nightshade family, add spice. (Apr.)

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Publishers Weekly

A fresh fatality forces China Bayles, herbalist, ex-lawyer and amateur sleuth, to confront the mystery of her emotionally distant father's death. China has never enjoyed an easy relationship with her recently revealed illegitimate half brother Miles, who hired China's husband McQuaid to investigate their father's death in a fiery car crash. When Miles himself is killed in a hit-and-run incident, China is named executor of his estate. She discovers that Miles, who has been keeping secrets from McQuaid, already knew a great deal more than he revealed about their father's death and several other suspicious deaths, all related to their father's legal work for a politically connected, none-too-ethical engineering firm that's grown prosperous on lucrative government contracts for half a century. For years Miles's mother Laura had kept his father's wrecked car hidden away in her cousin Ellie's Texas Hill Country barn. Once McQuaid sees the wreck, he quickly realizes that the fatal crash was no accident. When the barn is torched and Ellie is shot, China and McQuaid team up to reveal the killer. The conclusion to the trilogy exploring China's relationship with her father (Spanish Dagger, 2007, etc.) does a fine job of bringing together all the bits and pieces, even for those who have not read the first two installments.

Kirkus Reviews