In the Spirit of French Murder

After moving to France, Tabitha Knight has a new friend in fellow expat and Cordon Bleu student Julia Child, whose culinary tips come in quite handy. But something’s cooking in postwar Paris, and it isn’t just cheese soufflé . . . Tabitha has enjoyed an afternoon in Julia’s kitchen, but her return home is jarring. A woman bursts out the door of her grandfather’s rue de l’Université mansion babbling about messages from spirits and a warning Grand-père must heed. Oncle Rafe angrily sends the woman on her way, and neither man will answer Tabitha’s questions. But it’s not the last she sees of the mysterious visitor. Tabitha soon learns that Madame Vierca is a medium who claims to have visions of a dark fate that awaits Grand-père and Oncle Rafe. The very next night, Tabitha’s messieurs host a soiree at their new restaurant, inviting fellow Resistance fighters known as the Nine Bluets. To commemorate them, the dinner table sports a vase of nine pretty blue flowers. But shortly after the revelers leave, one of Grand-père’s old friends is found dead in the street . . . and one of the nine flowers is missing, When a second member of the Nine Bluets is found poisoned and a bluet flower is left with the body, Tabitha can’t ignore Madame Vierca’s predictions. She has no choice but to share her fears with the enigmatic Inspecteur Merveille. Soon, Tabitha is caught up in an investigation that takes her and Merveille to the seediest and strangest parts of the Left Bank. But they don’t have much time to find the killer before the remaining Bluets are targeted . . . including Grand-père and Oncle Rafe.