EMMA CHIZZIT AND THE NAPA NEMESIS

by Mary Bowen Hall ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 1992

This time out, Emma Chizzit, amateur sleuth and aging owner of A-1 Salvage, joins her old chum Frannie and half of Napa Valley in search of an unpublished children's book that Robert Louis Stevenson supposedly left at Fountaingrove, a 19th-century Utopian colony. Assisted by their would-be suitors, Vince and Mike, the two women are soon dogging the footsteps of a pair of millionaires, the Wulff twins, Manny and Morrie, inveterate practical jokers. Then Manny disappears, as does an artist whose sketch of him buck-naked is suddenly withdrawn from an exhibit. A mysterious handsome blond appears. A mysterious woman in a floppy hat pops up. A pair of Japanese businessmen in the sake industry skulk about. Next, Emma, while reconnoitering alone, is waylaid by the archvillain who has already murdered once, abducted one of the Wulff brothers, and is soon to murder several more times before this hoax of a plot is wrapped up by Emma and her gang. The plot is not only silly and implausible but unamusing and dull as well: a marked letdown from Emma's two prior, amiable excursions.

Pub Date: May 1, 1992

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: 168

Publisher: Walker

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1992

Categories: FICTION