Description

A bestselling author crafts a sweeping gothic tale in which, after the shocking death of her husband, a troubled young widow inherits a Tuscan estate from a mysterious benefactor and finds herself thrust into the crosshairs of a dangerous conspiracy.

Lately, Julia Pritzker is beginning to think she’s cursed. She’s lost her adoptive parents, then her husband is murdered. When she realizes that her horoscope essentially foretold his death, she begins to spiral. She fears her fate is written in the stars, not held in her own hands.

Then a letter arrives out of the blue, informing her that she has inherited a Tuscan villa and vineyard —but her benefactor is a total stranger named Emilia Rossi. Julia has no information about her biological family, so she wonders if Rossi could be a blood relative. Bewildered, she heads to Tuscany for answers.

There, Julia is horrified to discover that Rossi was a paranoid recluse with delusions of grandeur, who believed herself to be a descendent of Duchess Caterina Sforza, a legendary Renaissance ruler. Julia is stunned by her uncanny resemblance to Rossi, and even to Caterina. Then she unearths eerie parallels between them, including an obsession with astrology.

Before long, Julia suspects she’s being followed, and strange things begin to happen. Not even a chance meeting with a handsome Florentine can ease her disturbed mind. When events turn deadly, she breaks with reality. Julia’s harrowing struggle becomes a search for her identity, a race to save her sanity, and ultimately, a question of her very survival.  

Praise

"A page-turning exploration into love, loss, forces larger than ourselves, and the way in which our own pasts and our ancestors' histories resonate into our present, The Unraveling of Julia has all the hallmarks of the very best Lisa Scottoline novels, and yet is also something spectacularly new. I literally could not put down this brilliant, Gothic tale that takes readers into sumptuous Tuscany and Renaissance Italy and has us questioning the past, as we sit on the edge of our seats. This might just be my favorite Lisa Scottoline book yet, and that's saying a lot!" —Marie Benedict, New York Times bestselling author of The Queens of Crime
“The latest by Scottoline has it all: a shocking murder, a crumbling Tuscan villa, and a heroine forced to rise above her grief after a tragic loss. Scottoline deftly weaves a touch of astrology through this fast-paced thriller, and the result is a stunning novel that explores the lines between reality and dreams, sanity and madness, and will leave you breathless.” —Fiona Davis, New York Times bestselling author of The Stolen Queen
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