Julia has already had enough heartbreak and grief to last a lifetime. After losing both of her adoptive parents, Julia finds herself completely alone after a devastating event leaves her widowed in the brisk Brooklyn night. When a letter shows up at her door informing her that she's inherited a villa and vineyard in Tuscany along with a small fortune by a mysterious benefactor, Julia jumps at the chance for a new future.
 
Emilia Rossi, Julia's benefactor, is an alleged descendant of Duchess Caterina Sforza from the Italian Renaissance who bears an uncanny resemblance to Julia herself. With the hope of learning about her potential biological family, Julia digs into the lives of both Emilia and Caterina, finding eerie and tragic parallels between her life and Caterina's. The more she investigates, however, the more she and those around her are put in harm's way.
 
What Julia learns will put her in the crosshairs of a dangerous conspiracy and expose the truth of her own identity, changing her life forever – if she survives.

Lisa Scottoline is a #1 bestselling and Edgar Award-winning author of 33 novels. Lisa's books are book-club favorites, and she and her daughter Francesca Serritella have hosted an annual Big Book Club Party for over a thousand readers at her Pennsylvania farm, for the past twelve years. Lisa has been President of Mystery Writers of America and she reviews fiction and non-fiction for the New York Times, Washington Post, and The Philadelphia Inquirer. She also writes a weekly column with her daughter for The Philadelphia Inquirer entitled Chick Wit, a witty take on life from a woman’s perspective, which have been collected in a bestselling series of humorous memoirs. Lisa graduated magna cum laude in three years from the University of Pennsylvania, with a B.A. degree in English, and cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where she taught Justice & Fiction. She has over 30 million copies of her books in print and is published in over 35 countries. She lives with an array of disobedient pets, and wouldn’t have it any other way.