A TANGO TO DIE FOR!

A crime thriller steeped in food lore.

Lago’s novel opens on a tense scenario: Interpol officer Paul Lago and his team are in Argentina, anxiously awaiting a ransom call from the kidnappers of an American couple. Paul had been called in to investigate the murder of an American journalist and his cameraman, who’d themselves gone to Argentina to investigate the couple’s disappearance. Paul was too late for the journalists, who’d been found dead with the letters “O.N.” burned onto the soles of their feet, but he and his crew are still hoping to save the kidnap victims, and the incoming call sends them running across a field under the watchful eyes of a massive bull. They attempt to save the couple after Paul has played matador. Only a week later, Paul is greeting his old friend and romantic interest Celeste Humphries on her arrival in Argentina, and the two have no sooner dined and entered a tango contest than a gruesome development on the dance floor ensnares them both in a homicide investigation with obvious connections to the case that brought Paul to Argentina in the first place. Author Lago invests these twists and turns with a peppy narrative zest, and she loads every inch of the story with atmospheric and culinary details about Argentina. This can quite often feel forced. When Paul hands Celeste some candied peanuts from a street vendor, she responds, “What makes them so special is that they cook them in fine copper kettle pans and use pure concentrated vanilla bean paste, which is added in the final few seconds after they are taken off of the heat.” This sounds more like a guidebook than a person. The atmosphere of the story often seems too fizzy and playful for its more somber content.

An affable if overly expository thriller set in scenic Argentina.