There are lots of characters in the Napa Valley, from iconoclastic winemakers to the many lesser lights who make those wines possible. They are not all likable people. But only one of them ends up dead in a tank of fermenting Pinot Noir. And Alex Stone, the young editor of the local paper, is in the right place at the right time.

Or is he?

Author Paul Wagner has taught in the wine program at Napa Valley College for more than thirty years and spent more than forty years in the wine business. Based in the Napa Valley, his wine clients have included top producers and regions from around the world, and his books on wine have won international awards. While his Dan Courtwright mysteries are set in the Sierra Nevada, this is the first mystery he has written about the world he knows best-the Napa Valley and wine.