This novel, suitable as YA reading, is another modernized Romeo-Juliet romance but with a happier ending. That it has a mystery to be solved is only an addition to make the central romance story richer.

In the story, 18-year-old Stephanie Cooper has grown up in New Zealand with her mother. Her father and grandmother live in England. Stephanie is about to study history in Oxford, and she decides to spend the summer before the school year with her grandmother in Carlswick. As soon as she arrives England in the train to Carlswick, she runs into James Knox, a lead guitarist in a rock band, and these two are attracted to each other.

What Stephanie finds out a bit later is that her family the Coopers and James’s Knox family are still feuding since World War II. Although the two want to find out what all this feuding is about, both defend their own families. When Stephanie spots a famous painting in the Knox estate’s library which she knows is one piece of the stolen art by the Nazis, she begins investigating and suspecting James’s older brother, cruel and evil Alex, and even her own father. In fact, soon enough, most anyone is suspect. There is also another side to the puzzle. Sophie is the spitting image of her great aunt who was killed because she fell in love with a Knox. Will Stephanie be able to unwind this tangled web? This is up to the reader to find out.

There are many positives in this novel. First, a good amount of research has been gone into the stolen Nazi art. Then, there are all the secondary characters who add greatly to the overall plot, and all characterization is skillfully handled. The storytelling is very good, as is the use of the language. The story flows well, and the plot, as complex as it is with many twists and turns, shows mastery in construction. Then, at the end of the book, although this story’s problem is solved, a threat by Alex signals a second book in the series.

the characterization.

that Alex's character was written as all bad, but for the sake of this story, that can be overlooked.

is SL Beaumont, from New Zealand. She is writing The Carlswick Mysteries series.

It is well written and I didn't lose interest while reading it. It has a good hooking system, somehow, despite the fact that this is a first book for the author.

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Created May 07, 2018 at 10:50pm • Submit your own review...