Murder in Lascaux

Draine and Hinden (A Castle in the Backyard, a memoir about the Périgord region) put their knowledge of France to good use in their first novel. The special tour of the Lascaux cave’s Cro-Magnon paintings that art historian Nora Barnes and her antique dealer husband, Toby Sandler, take to kick off their Dordogne vacation is abruptly cut short by the garroting of another visitor, government investigator Michel Malbert. In an effort to recover their bearings, the couple sign up for a cooking class from Marianne de Cazelle, one of the aristocratic owners of the nearby chateau where they’re staying, while Nora also conducts research on Marianne’s ancestor Jenny Marie, an obscure painter. She goes on to uncover the Cazelles’ troubled history and a possible link to Malbert’s death over the course of a whodunit that nicely balances a breezily light travelogue with urgency and suspense. Readers will hope this is the first of a series. (Nov.)