Skiing into Murder, Book Three of the Laura Morland Mystery Series

Laura Morland is back! So is Thomas, her enigmatic art detective love interest, who makes a dramatic and unexpected appearance as Laura rides a train through Switzerland's most magnificent scenery in winter. The reunion is heartfelt but smelly due to its location in a rest room. Thomas is posing as a train conductor while tracking down art stolen by the Nazis long ago, and to Laura's horror, gets shot at for his efforts. Then his vivacious daughter Catherine makes her own surprising appearance in the dead of a frigid winter night to announce that her father has disappeared.

Fortunately, Laura has Violet, the six foot red-headed detective friend who has recruited her to help prevent a kidnapping at an international conference, to assist in the search for Thomas. It soon becomes obvious that Violet’s case and the case Thomas is pursuing are intertwined. As the four sleuths try to fit the pieces of the puzzle together, they become embroiled in a bewildering variety of criminal activities that involve long-lost art, threats against innocent children, their old nemesis sex trafficking and illicit drug peddling. Romance flourishes despite the dangers, for Catherine as well as Laura and Thomas.

The action takes place in two of Switzerland's most prestigious ski resorts - Zermatt and Murren, small car-less towns in the Alps that nestle beneath Switzerland’s most famous peaks. Laura and her friends have a memorable breakfast in the Piz Gloria, the revolving restaurant on a mountain top where a well-known James Bond movie was filmed, and where they spot Thomas with a gun at his back below them. A wild chase on skis follows to an old bomb shelter (the Swiss have thousands of them) that holds clues to both mysteries as well as art treasures that have thus far eluded frantic efforts to find them. It also holds more than one criminal with a bullet hole in the middle of his forehead.

Blizzards, more murders, one on skis that threatens to send Laura careening head first down the icy slopes, an ancient castle in which the villains are finally and dramatically exposed, keep the pace going, as do attempts on Laura’s life that never quite work, mysterious intrigues and tangled relationships between children and parents who may or may not really be their parents. Train trips with incredible vistas provide moments of calm.

Above all, readers are treated to a stunning cast of new and unforgettable characters: the preposterous Lindsey, who may or may not be a CIA agent; Maurice, a Swiss Jew who lost everything in the holocaust and could be an art thief, but whose warmth brings comfort to young people especially; and Felicia, an eccentric woman whose life has been filled with adventure and at nearly 80 still is. Like many others in this mystery, she might be savior or sinner. Even the surprise ending may leave readers wondering who is truly the sinner. Our sleuths have no doubt about the identity of the villains; whether the killer or killers deserves that noxious label is open to doubt.