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Brush with death
Brush with Death is Annie Kincaid’s newest adventure in the Art Lover’s mystery series...

Working nights to restore murals in a building full of cremated remains is strange enough, but chasing a crypt-robbing ghoul through a graveyard is downright creepy.  In Brush with Death, San Francisco artist Annie Kincaid finds herself drawn into a decades-old mystery involving some illustrious graveyard residents and Raphael's most intimate portrait, dubbed La Fornarina, or "the little baker girl".  Could the Raphael "copy" hanging amidst funerary urns actually be the priceless original?  Is the masked crypt-robber somehow connected to the Raphael? Or is the painting part of a larger puzzle involving Annie's unrepentant grandfather, master art forger Georges LeFleur, and an Italian "fakebuster" out to ruin him?  Annie's under pressure to figure things out...before she finds her permanent home amongst the ashes.
Read A Review:

Cemeteries and Annie Kincaid? Well, they can be creepy and wouldn’t be her first choice of places to hang out in the middle of the night, but she’s got a job, for M-O-N-E-Y, restoring some paintings at the Chapel of the Chimes after hours.

If only she hadn’t decided to take a break maybe she wouldn’t have gotten involved in a ghoul chase with anthropology student, Cindy Tanaka. If she hadn’t, she’d never have gotten into the mess she finds herself in…

Cindy believes the Raphael painting hanging in the columbarium might be the original La Fornarina, but of course that’s impossible. It’s where it belongs, in Rome. But when Annie checks the painting out, she discovers a digital copy, not the original nor the 19th century copy it’s labeled to be. There’s got to be a logical explanation. Yet Annie begins to wonder exactly what the explanation is, especially when things start to happen, from murder to the blackmail of her grandfather to ghoul burglars and more.

With the best of intentions and to save Georges behind, Annie tries to get to the bottom of things. But unfortunately disaster and trouble follows before she can find the murderer and figure out where the real La Fornarina is or who has it.

It’s great to see recurring characters such as Pete, Frank, Mary, and Michael, but it’s nice to meet new and potentially recurring (hint) characters like Mrs. Henderson and Catiz. Yes, Annie is the central character, but each of these supporting characters brings out both the best and worst in her. And in Brush with Death Annie shines.
 
Hailey Lind is a very detail oriented author from the plot to art and its history. Some may say too detailed, but take heed, those details may be a clue that leads to a clue…so if you skip and skim you do so at the risk of missing something vital.

Beneath the wit and off-beat characters lies a multifaceted mystery. A masterpiece! You definitely get your money’s worth with a Hailey Lind novel.

Connie Payne, onceuponaromance.com