Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

A brisk Italian investigator solves crimes, handles a tricky personal life, and navigates the elaborate criminal investigation bureaucracy of Naples. The discovery of a dead body turns Nikki Serafino’s idyllic getaway on the Bay of Naples into a busman’s holiday, and not a pleasant one. Nikki works as a liaison between the U.S. military and the Italian police, investigating crimes involving U.S. service members. She and cop colleague Valerio are aboard her pride and joy, the Calypso, when a corpse gets tangled underneath. Shortly afterward, Nikki’s investigating an apparently minor car accident involving American naval commander Charles McAllister when she happens upon another corpse in a red Jeep on the side of the road. These seemingly straightforward crimes turn out to have surprising connections. The complications in Nikki’s professional life are matched by those in her personal life, as her ex, Tito, shadows her and threatens her new relationship with the hot Enzo. Her brothers, Adriano and Gianni, and her bubbly Aunt Izzy are also in the mix. The Neapolitan setting and the details of underwater investigation give Heider’s debut an offbeat and entertaining gloss. Immersing Nikki in the local culture, she presents a Naples as murderous as some American cities: “To be in Naples was to accept the danger.” But the torrent of disruptions on the criminal and personal fronts and the extra characters and layers of bureaucracy that Nikki’s job involves, however true to life, may well distract readers from the more compelling matters of plot and character development. A lively procedural with a high-powered heroine and a setting that would be idyllic if not for those murders. Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Publishers Weekly
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Former Navy analyst Heider delivers an intricate and impressive debut about the killing of two American sailors in Italy. Nikki Serafino, an investigator for U.S. military police, has a day of sailing in Naples with her friend and fellow officer, Valerio, interrupted twice: first to rescue a woman left to drown by her abusive boyfriend, and then by the discovery of an unidentified corpse in the water. Then an American sailor is found shot dead on the outskirts of the city, and forensics reveal that the corpse in the water was boiled alive. The ensuing investigation plunges Nikki, Valerio, and the Italian police into a matrix of betrayals and back-room deals between the U.S. Navy and the camorra, a network of organized crime clans in Naples. Heider deepens the central mystery by fleshing out her heroes’ family lives and complicated relationships to both Naples and the American military; Nikki, in particular, jumps off the page, with her struggles as a woman in law enforcement vividly highlighted. Toss in a pulse-pounding climax, and Heider has a promising potential series on her hands. Agent: Sharon Pelletier, Dystel, Goderich & Bourret. (July)