I could not put this down once I started reading. It starts out simply enough; the death of a college professor who no one seems to know anything about. Paul Tomm is a reporter for a small town paper who starts to dig into the professor's death - not really finding out anything of substance, but lots of small things that seem to add up to more.

Throughout the novel are chapters dedicated to antiquities that are related to alchemy; the act of transforming one thing into another. They are snippets of world history from all over the globe, snippets of archeaology and folklore that enhance and deepen the mystery.

When the end is revealed and the pieces all click - it is breathtaking and I just closed the book and sat and thought.

Another Wexford mystery. I’ve read about 5-6 of the Wexford mystery not in any particular order, but I think I actually like Wexford in this one. He’s older, more compassionate and a little less condescending.  When two teenagers and their “sitter”  (Joanna) go missing, their histrionic mother is sure they have drowned in the raising flood waters, but Wexford isn’t so sure and when their bodies don’t turn up, the search continues.

With every day that goes by, Wexford knows the likelihood of them all being alive and safe is less and less. When the sitter turns up dead in her car on a remote estate, the search for the children heats up.

The novel is incredibly suspenseful and just a little predictable as the author litters the pages with clues about the real reason for Joanna’s death and her involvement in the children’s disappearance.