Kaleidoscope

by Dorothy Gilman

Ballantine, January, 2002.
Hardcover, 244 pages.
ISBN: 0345448200

Kaleidoscope by Dorothy Gilman

In 1975, readers met the Countess Karitska, a genteel, elegant, old world psychic who had recently fallen hard times. Never one to stay down for long, she rents a shabby brownstone in New York City, and proceeds to help people using psychometry (when she picks up an object, she can read things about the owner.) Now, Madame Karitska is back, and she's better than ever. With the help of her policeman friend, Detective Lieutenant Pruden, Madame Karitska solves a series of puzzles: the murder of a wealthy businessman, locating the missing owner of a briefcase full of diamonds, finding the murderer of a young college student, and assisting an intelligence officer who is trying to stop a terrorist attack on the nation's electric supply.

Madame Kartiska's life goes on as if there had been no twenty-five year gap in her story at all. Dorothy Gilman moves the characters neatly to the present day - and they fit right into modern life. Considering that this book must have been finished by mid-2001 in order to be turned into the publisher, the terrorist storyline is eerily prescient. Madame Karitska is an absolutely delightful and mysterious character, who deserves more adventures in the very near future.

Kaleidoscope is available for purchase on Amazon.com

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This review was published in the March, 2002 of The Internet Writing Journal.