β Scribed by Maxwell, A E
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
Private eye Fiddler (The Frog and the Scorpion is back in another dandy caper. When his marriage fell apart some years back, Sandra AutreyNapa Valley vinter, cook and lover extraordinaireknew how to put him back on his feet. Now Sandra is in terrible trouble. She's mortgaged the family wine business to the hilt in order to finance a restaurant venture, and things are going very wrong: the help is robbing the till, a chef turns out to be a hepatitis carrier and an arsonist nearly burns the place down. It adds up to a deliberate campaign, Fiddler thinks. Then the phylloxera root louse (the parasite that wiped out the French wine industry a century ago) turns up in the Autrey vineyard, the newspapers broadcast the threatwhich has the potential to destroy Napa Valley's viticultureand the bank threatens to foreclose. But by this time, Fiddler, whose specialty once was the violin and now is fiddling around in other people's business, has taken a hand in the game. Maxwell manages a slam-bang climax here, and the California wine business background is unusual and entertaining.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.
"Maxwell manages a slam-bang climaxΓ’β¬Β¦ and the California wine business background is unusual and entertaining." --Publishers Weekly
"Evokes with grace, elegance and love the colors, smells and sounds of Napa Valley wine-making." --Vanity Fair
"By far [Maxwell's] best, a California thriller with very real characters and dialogue and a violent, unexpected ending you won't soon forget." --Palo Alto Times Tribune
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### From Publishers Weekly Private eye Fiddler (The Frog and the Scorpion is back in another dandy caper. When his marriage fell apart some years back, Sandra AutreyNapa Valley vinter, cook and lover extraordinaireknew how to put him back on his feet. Now Sandra is in terrible trouble. She's mortga
### From Publishers Weekly Private eye Fiddler (The Frog and the Scorpion is back in another dandy caper. When his marriage fell apart some years back, Sandra AutreyNapa Valley vinter, cook and lover extraordinaireknew how to put him back on his feet. Now Sandra is in terrible trouble. She's mortga
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