Telling Lies by Cathi Stoler

3 stars
r-1
Copy received for review through Tribute Books

I thought the premise of this book was interesting and compelling.

I think it had a little bit of an identity crisis, though.  On the one hand, you have a determined amatuer sleuth of sorts trying to unravel the mystery of her friend's supposedly dead husband.  Kind of "cozy mystery" type heroine and all.

On the other hand, though, this is a major international suspense/thriller type, with the cop and the FBI agent and the PI all after a) the supposedly dead man, b) the major art collector who's probably dealing in looted art, and c) whoever's stepping in to buy the $150 million painting involved.  Oh, and don't forget the Mossad agent trying to recover the painting.

Given all of that, the stakes are just too high for the kind of stupid things cozy mystery heroines tend to do.  Like confront a seemingly harmless bad guy all alone.

And really, I didn't buy the "relationship" between the heroine and the cop.  All they did was yell at each other.  And half the time it seemed like the anger was for no reason.

It also really reads like a sequel-- lots of references to a previous case which was when/how they all met.  But this is the author's first published novel.  So no way to read the earlier story.

Overall, I liked the premise and it was an interesting read (but the copyediting was TERRIBLE) but it didn't quite work for me.