This book is much more of a small town romance with a side of mystery than any of Harper's other books, just a very different energy overall. While Falk investigates this mystery, he has a new romance brewing on the sidelines and big decisions that could affect his career and overall life.

The characters also have a relationship to the setting - in this case, they’ve spent time at the site as teenagers, worked at the festival, etc so you can imagine them moving around these places. The plot is well-crafted, juggling multiple mysteries in the present and the past, dispensing little clues and a fair amount of misdirection. A year later, Kim Gillespie’s absence still casts a long shadow as her friends and loved ones gather to welcome a new addition to the family. There are a lot of characters to keep track of and given how interrelated they are, I sometimes struggled to keep everything straight (especially since the story also goes back and forth between several time periods and there are multiple POVs.

The last time Falk visited this area, a mother abandoned her child in the parking lot at the annual wine festival. Kim had not been found and there have been no clues or explanation as to why she would leave her baby behind. A linen square normally used as a sunshield was draped over the opening between the hood and the pram. I wish Harper didn't include them--they explain what happened to one character and add insight into another, but because their chapters come near the very end, they pulled me out of the narrative and disrupted the flow of events.

In questa occasione siamo nel sud dell’Australia, immersi in vigneti e aziende vinicole che fanno capo a una piccola città. Jane Harper gifts us with the presence of Aaron Falk, once again, in her third installment of this series.In the small town of Marralee in South Australia's vineyard region, not far from Adelaide, the annual festival was about to get underway once again.