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Rating: 
Summary: Grab a Glass of Wine to Enjoy This Mystery
Review: "Grape Noir" offers an interesting look into the world of the wine business. We're first introduced to Margot O'Banion, film editor, and her lover and work companion, Max Skull, film director. Long overdue for a much needed vacation, Margot and Max venture into the wine country of California. But when a guest at the Maison Gemir winery tasting drops dead before their eyes from poisoned wine, their vacation suddenly comes to a screeching halt. Soon they find themselves caught between battling brothers, greedy business men, and loads of family problems, not to mention a killer who is still on the loose."Grape Noir" is book two of the Margot O'Banion Mystery Series. It offers a great deal of suspense and a twist at the end that you won't see coming. There are many details about the wine business that tells you Mrs. Sloane has done her homework. The characters are well-rounded and completely different in almost ever aspect imaginable. Overall I found it to be an interesting read.
Rating:
Summary: Not bad, but...
Review: I tend to enjoy mysteries that have a wine or winery theme, and this one wasn't bad, but could have finished better. The storytelling and characters were good, but it seemed to me that several of the side stories weren't resolved at the end - it just seemed to end too quickly. Overall, a good addition to the wine/winery themed mystery genre.
Rating:
Summary: Not bad, but...
Review: I tend to enjoy mysteries that have a wine or winery theme, and this one wasn't bad, but could have finished better. The storytelling and characters were good, but it seemed to me that several of the side stories weren't resolved at the end - it just seemed to end too quickly. Overall, a good addition to the wine/winery themed mystery genre.
Rating: 
Summary: Sweet Harvest
Review: Margot O'Banion Lake, film editor extraordinaire, and her live-elsewhere lover, Max Skull, director, are still in the business of putting together images for the giant screen. In the span of this novel, however, they are on a long-deferred vacation, voyaging through California grape-vine country and its wineries. Too bad Max and Margot's first stop is the last for a fellow Chardonnay-sipping traveler--and a fan--who drops in her tracks, poisoned, presumably by a sampling of the drink in her hand. Daunted, but nonetheless hungry, Margot and Max go on to dinner at an exclusive restaurant--where, famous or not, they can't get in. Invited to join a couple they've been chatting with, our series' protagonists meet one branch of the winemaking Cinefucco family, a lineage divided, and now endangered by a wine recall. Max and Margo link up with Paolo Cinefucco and his wife, Diana, not just for supper, but at their estate where, the next day, Paolo's sister Loretta Rose is to be married. In the thick of a family feud, an ill-starred romance, and yet another murder, Margot is left to deal--in her usual perceptive and intelligent manner--with forging a resolution to all encountered difficulties. Written in a greatly updated Daphne DuMaurier style, Grape Noir leaves the reader a delightedly nervous wreck throughout. Bad things are always on the verge of happening as Margot makes new friends, people watches, and gets left behind in the darkness of a frightening wine cave. A great deal is going on here and no one knows when the wheel will cease to spin or who else's life will be on the line. The writing flows smoothly and pulls the reader in, with much amusement and compelling characterizations along the way. The novel is a journey through a romantic and idyllic California countryside constituting a persona in itself, with fine dining and all the accessories of a lavishly accoutered wedding included. Don't know how wine is made or how a dastardly killing can be solved? Better look here first. Kit Sloane has followed her smash hit Final Cut with another set of revelations. Sit down, pour yourself a "bruiser of a Zinfandel" or a "plush and sexy Cabernet" and sip, if you dare...G. Miki Hayden, Writing the Mystery (Intrigue Press, Fall 2001).
Rating:
Summary: Grape Noir
Review: Talk about suspense - I caught myself holding my breath any number of times. All the unexpected twists and turns were great. Ms. Sloane has developed characters with just the right combination of flaws and virtues to make them real and make you care about what happens to them. Grape Noir goes to all the wine lovers and mystery lovers on my Xmas list.
Rating:
Summary: Grape Noir
Review: Talk about suspense - I caught myself holding my breath any number of times. All the unexpected twists and turns were great. Ms. Sloane has developed characters with just the right combination of flaws and virtues to make them real and make you care about what happens to them. Grape Noir goes to all the wine lovers and mystery lovers on my Xmas list.
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