FIRST IN A NEW SERIES! A deadly search for sour grapes . . . Norrie Ellington is a successful screenwriter living in New York City. She’s also been a silent partner for her family’s winery upstate—until her sister and brother-in-law take a year-long sabbatical. With an experienced staff doing the work, Norrie figures Two Witches Winery will run itself while she enjoys the countryside and … will run itself while she enjoys the countryside and writes in peace and quiet.
Unfortunately, there’s a sour grape in the town of Penn Yan who doesn’t care for vineyards. Bed and breakfast owner Elsbeth Waters complains to everyone who’ll listen that the local wineries are bad for her business. But when Elsbeth’s body is found on Norrie’s property, the victim of foul play, the screenwriter-turned-vintner dons a sleuthing cap to uncover the identity of a killer who told the B&B proprietress to put a cork in it—permanently . . .
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Dollycas’s Thoughts
We arrive at the Two Witches Winery in upstate New York with Norrie Ellington. A family-owned winery that her sister, Francine, and brother-in-law, Jason, run as she is a very silent partner. Her brother-in-law has been given a research grant that will take the couple out of the country for a year and they have asked Norrie to take over while they are gone. Norrie has a job, a full-time job, as a screenwriter and really doesn’t want to step in, but her sister assures her the staff handles most everything. She just needs Norrie to oversee things, attend a few meetings, and handle any emergencies that arise. There will be plenty of time to work on her screenplays and make her deadlines.
Before Francine and Jason even arrive at their, no cell signal, out in the sticks, Costa Rican destination one of those rare emergencies arises in the form of a dead body among the Riesling vines. A woman Norrie had the displeasure of meeting upon her arrival. Elsbeth Waters was the owner of the nearby bed & breakfast and constant complainer of almost everything that happened in the town of Penn Yan and all the surrounding wineries. Let’s just say there is no shortage of suspects. There is also a couple of businessmen trying to buy up all the Penn Yan wineries so that they can open their own mega-winery business. Not really an emergency, because there is no way they are selling, unless they have something to do with Elsbeth’s death.
Norrie feels like she is in the middle of one her drama filled movies. With the body found on her land, and the police are eyeing her as a suspect, she has a vested interest in seeing the killer brought to justice and she doesn’t have a lot of faith in the local law enforcement. She hasn’t been around in a long time so as she gets to know everyone she decides to do a little snooping too.
I am late to the party on this series and am upset with myself. I have been enjoying the author’s Sophie Kimball Mysteries while this one was screaming from my Kindle. I am determined to get Chardonnayed to Rest read too before Pinot Red or Dead? hits stores.
I liked Norrie immediately and Francine too for the short time we got to spend with her. We are also introduced to a large cast of characters that make up the staff at Two Witches Winery, the other local winery owners, the victim, and her niece, and the businessmen that could crush not only grapes but the dreams of everyone in the area. The author’s do a great job of making each character unique so it is very easy to keep everyone straight. Cammy runs the tasting room and she and Norrie become fast friends, as do the men that own the nearby winery. Theo and Don are good friends with Francine and Jason and Norrie knows she can trust them. They really have her back and help her in many ways. I truly enjoyed the way so many rallied around to help Norrie get her feet under herself with the winery and in her mission to catch a murderer.
Two characters I can’t fail to mention and they need their own paragraph is the dog and the goat on the cover. Charlie is a Brindle Plott Hound and Alvin is a Nigerian Dwarf goat. Charlie stole my heart, even if he does need a bath almost every day. Alvin and Norrie don’t get off to a good start but he played a major part when he needed to.
The mystery itself was a real treat. Plenty of suspects and some crazy theories kept me guessing the entire story. I was kinda on the right trail, but some red herrings diverted my attention more than once. Norrie took some huge risks and while scary, the authors added some comic relief at the perfect times and in the perfect amounts.
I probably will never travel to Finger Lakes Wine Country in upstate New York and their 3 Wine Trails, but I sure had fun on my first literary trip there. J.C. Eaton gave us a bird’s eye view and I am excited about my next visit. Chardonnayed to Rest is queued up as one of the next books on my Kindle, just waiting for me to get started. Stay tuned for my review.
A Riesling To Die is the first book in The Wine Trail Mysteries series.
Norrie Ellington, a successful screenwriter, has reluctantly agreed to manage the families winery, when her sister, Francine, tells her that she and her husband Josh are going to research a rare bug in the wilds of Costa Rica. Norrie has been a “silent” partner and is somewhat familiar with the day to day operation and has started visiting the workers, many of she knows and is busy meeting the new ones. As she is talking with the tasting room manager, Cammy, Norrie is approached by a lady wanting to speak with Francine. After explaining to the lady that Francine is out the country, the lady tells her that she has filed a complaint with the county about their winery setting off cannon fire in the mornings. Cammy soon explains that the lady, Elsbeth Waters owns the B&B next to the winery and complains about everyone and everything in the Fingers Lake region. A day or two later as dawn was about to break, Norrie is raised out of her sleep, with pounding on her front door. She arrived at the door to find two of the field workers telling her there was an emergency in the vineyard. The workers led her to where a dead body lays and it turns out to be Elsbeth Waters.
Several of the local wineries meet on a regular basis to discuss was is going on in the area and try to help each other with similar problems. It is at one of these meetings that Norrie finds out that a land developer has been trying to buy up many of the local wineries to form a mega-winery and make it a tourist attraction.
With a great deal of help from Theo and Don, owners of The Grey Egret Winery, she sets out to clear the name of her Two Witches Winery in the death of Waters and hopefully learn who the killer is before any other deaths occur and in addition to put a stop to the land developers from acquiring any vineyards and turning the beautiful Finger Lakes into an amusement park atmosphere.
I found this story to be very entertaining and very well written with just the right amount of discussion about wineries, winemaking, and wines to be informative and not to overshadow the mystery itself. The story has a very good cast of believable and likable character and will be looking forward to learning more about them in future books.
I will be watching for the next in series to what Norrie will get up to next.
I was excited for a story in the wine country of upstate NY but I never felt I could “see” the setting from the book. There was quite a bit of description about how the men looked and all the food that was eaten but not much on the wines or wine country. I never really felt connected to the story. Out of the blue, Norrie comes up with a very dangerous plan and since she writes love stories, I have no idea how she would have even thought of such an elaborate plan so it felt off. I love the other series by this author so I’ll try book 2 of this.
This was an interesting first book in a series. I liked the setting of a wine trail and the town. Norrie Ellington takes over running her family’s winery while her sister and brother-in-law go to Costa Rica for a year. Unfortunately, Norrie’s first day on her own starts with the staff finding a dead body in the vineyard. Now, Norrie sets out to find a killer and stop some developers from buying up the local wineries. I look forward to reading more of this series.
Norrie Ellington goes from silent partner to full-time winery owner when she steps in as her sister and brother-in-law takes a much needed year-long sabbatical. What could possibly go wrong?! How about a murder. When a local B&B owner (who dislikes wineries) is found dead on Norrie’s property, it is up to Norrie to find out who did it and why.
The author has a wonderful way of writing her characters. I felt myself drawn to Norrie and was cheering from the sidelines as she tried as hard as she could to fill in for her sister while also trying to solve the murder. This was a delightful cozy mystery and I am looking forward to more in the series.
This was an interesting first-in-series that taught me something new – I had no idea that there were vineyards and wineries in New York! While the characters were not my all-time favorites, they were each uniquely able to add something to the mix. The multi-tiered mystery is well written and one that I couldn’t quite solve no matter how I tried.
I think my disappointment was with the protagonist, who made choices in an attempt to solve a mystery that were not quite what I might have chosen that could have had serious repercussions to the family. Norrie is a screenwriter who left the vineyard and winery behind when she left for college, then moved to Manhattan with a position as a screenwriter. She was still a silent partner in the business while her sister managed every aspect of the winery. Her husband had an opportunity to go to Costa Rica for a year to study a rare bug on a grant, so Norrie went back to New York to oversee the excellent managers her sister had in place – and write her screenplays in the meantime.
A woman who was troublesome to all of the vineyard owners around was found dead in the vineyard the morning after Norrie’s sister and brother-in-law left. She didn’t think the deputy was doing a good job investigating, so she decided to do some sleuthing herself. Her attempts to find the killer brought the questions right back around on herself, and it took some embarrassed honesty to get off the hook. She continued to search, however, to get the cloud of suspicion off of the family winery again.
I would definitely read another in the series, as the mystery is very well-written in spite of the protagonist. While she made some bad decisions, her heart was in the right place, and this has definitely been a learning experience for her. And thankfully, with the lack of communication available to her sister in Costa Rica, Norrie’s sister was spared the details until the killer/s was caught. I do still recommend this mystery for the overall suspense and intrigue, and look forward to the next one.
I enjoyed reading the book, especially since it takes place in upstate New York in the Finger Lakes region. I would like more nitty-griitty about viniculture. It is so interesting to learn about the complexities of growing grapes and making wine.
The plot was fun and kept you thinking you knew who the real villain was.. You didn’t. It was fun to read.
A Riesling to Die is the first novel in The Wine Trail Mysteries. Norrie Ellington, a screenwriter, has reluctantly agreed to oversee the Two Witches Vineyard, in which she is a co-owner, for a year while her sister and her husband go off to Costa Rica on a research trip. Norrie believes that with the experienced winery staff, her role will be minimal which will leave her plenty of quiet time to write. The day after Francine and Jason leave the local crank is found dead in the new Riesling vines. Norrie decides to investigate the matter because the winery cannot afford to lose money or have bad publicity. She starts asking questions and believes she has discovered the guilty party. Norrie hatches with a plan to get the individual to confess. Unfortunately, things do not go quite as expected. Join Norrie at the Two Witches Vineyard in her search for a killer in A Riesling to Die.
A Riesling to Die is a light cozy mystery. Norrie is one of those main characters that babbles when nervous and turns into a blithering idiot in front of a handsome man. There was a lack of development in Norrie’s character. The author fails to provide her background which would establish the character (any of the characters). There are some unique people working in the tasting room of the winery. Glenda, Roger, Lizzie and Cammy provide comic relief along with Cammy’s cousin, Marc and Enzo (they cracked me up). There is also a dog that manages to get into smelly messes every day (it makes me wonder if these people have not heard of a leash or a fenced in area for dogs) and Alvin, the spitting dwarf goat that is an attraction for children (just what every vineyard needs when you have guests wandering about). The mystery was straightforward, and the identity of the guilty party came as no surprise. Norrie’s investigation was proceeding nicely until she came up a harebrained scheme to reel in who she believes is the killer (she jumped to conclusions instead of following the evidence and thinking things through). The grand plan jeopardizes the winery and reminds me of Lucy Ricardo’s schemes. Norrie’s spends a significant amount of time speculating on who could have committed the crime. You can really see her overactive imagination at work. All the loose ends are wrapped up at the end of the story. A Riesling to Die had a good start, but then it stalled out for a while and then it became foolish. There is some interesting information about growing grapes, taking care of the vines, running a vineyard and producing wines. I am curious how many dead people will turn up in the area during Norrie’s year at Two Witches Winery (maybe the author will throw in a burglary). A Riesling to Die is a quick read that will appeal to readers who prefer lighter cozy mysteries filled with quirky characters. The next book in The Wine Trail Mysteries is Chardonnayed to Rest.
An easy read and entertaining. I enjoyed it.
Great read if you are from the Finger Lakes Region.
Couldn’t finish it because I hate it when smart women do dumb things. It told me a lot about wineries, though, which was interesting.
Fun adventures in wine country. Good story. Not too predictable
A little simplistic but entertaining.
I loved the dog and the twisted turns it took
A nice read for a quiet evening. The characters are intresting and the mytsery is compounded by the number of characters and their objectives.
A fun first entry in a new series. The characters are well drawn and the setting in the New York Finger Lakes is intrresting. I look forward to the next installment
I love easy reading, interesting mysteries
A good cozy mystery to curl up with on a cold night under a soft cover with a bottle of wine.
If I were in upstate New York touring wineries, Two Witches Winery would be one of my stops. The cozy ambiance of the tasting room calls to visitors to sit, sip, and savor samples before making their take-home selections. Protagonist Norris Ellington is actually a successful screenwriter who’s come to oversee the winery while her sister and brother-in-law travel to Costa Rica for a year. Norrie’s inner Nancy Drew kicks in fast when the body of a querulous Bed and Breakfast owner turns up dead in the middle of some new vines the workers just planted!
A dangerous masquerade with two powerful businessmen could cork a killer or cost Norrie’s family the winery. With a mixed bouquet of suspects, this debut story in the Wine Trail Mysteries will have readers putting their thinking caps on if they want to solve the mystery before the author reveal. I had one person tapped as suspicious, but couldn’t figure out motive. Plenty of chuckles throughout the story, and a great supporting cast of characters for Norrie. Add a cute dwarf goat and a smart dog and this cozy is great entertainment.
I reviewed a digital ARC via NetGalley and the publisher.
A Riesling to Die by J.C. Eaton was a easy cozy mystery that captured my attention from the first.
Norrie Ellington is a successful screenwriter and a silent partner in her family’s winery. Normally the winery is run by her sister and husband but they are off to Costa Rica for a year and Norrie is guilted into overseeing the winery while they are gone. I liked Norrie although she often struck me as being easily overwhelmed and jumps to conclusions while sleuthing. J. C. Eaton does a fabulous job of describing the Finger Lakes district of New York; and the character development is well done as introductions into this first of a new cozy series. I liked many of the secondary characters and look forward to seeing them again as this series continues. A fast paced plot that flowed smoothly as the twists and turns take the reader to a reveal that I did not see coming.
I voluntarily reviewed an Advance Reader Copy of this book from Lyrical Underground via NetGalley. All of the above opinions are my own.