A Riesling to Die–review

I had read this five days ago (July 10) but somehow must have forgotten to do a blog post about it. Like the book I just finished, this one is also written by J.C. Eaton, the husband and wife team of Ann Goldfarb and Jim Clapp. This is the first in their newer series, Wine Trail Mysteries.

My Goodreads review:

A Riesling to Die by J.C. Eaton

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was the first book I’ve read by this author, also known as husband and wife writing team of Ann Goldfarb and Jim Clapp, but it definitely won’t be my last. I’m going to start their other series very soon! I really loved this book and all the diverse and sometimes quirky characters. There were twists and turns throughout and I definitely didn’t guess this killer.

Norrie Ellington was part owner of a winery in the Finger Lakes region of NY, but her day job was living in the city and writing screenplays. Her sister Francine and Francine’s husband, Jason needed to go to Costa Rica for Jason’s entomology research, and they needed her to oversee management of the Two Witches Winery for a year. Norrie expected to simply sit on the sidelines, run a meeting every so often and possibly help with hiring summer temp employees. What she hadn’t banked on was the murder of one of the community’s most disliked person, Elsbeth Waters, who owned the local B&B. Since Norrie herself was a person of interest, she was determined to find the real killer. With the help of two new friends, Theo and Don, the couple who ran a neighboring winery, she was able to eventually figure things out and bring the real killer to justice. Alvin, the dwarf goat even had a hand, or should I say hoof, in catching the killer.

I think Theo and Don had to be my favorite characters! They were just all-round, textbook good friends to have. They listened, they had Norrie over for meals and they gave her their full support, not to mention loaning some employees if needed. Cammy seemed like a nice person too since Norrie had decided she was going to the one of the few people she told about her sleuthing. I got a kick out of Lizzie, a retired CPA who worked for the winery and had a super-charged interest in sleuthing like Nancy Drew. She didn’t really help or hinder, but she made for an interesting character.

The book was well-written and I was actually glad it didn’t get into the wine-making processes or anything technical because while I like the whole idea of a winery (setting, cool building etc) I’m not real interested in the processes. Maybe the tasting, though, lol. 😉

I’m really anxious for the next book to come out since there was a description at the end of the book telling briefly what will happen in it.

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