lilysreviews

Blurb: Ragoczy Ferenz, Grof Szent-Germain is busy in Europe, getting his publishing and shipping businesses working again when he encounters an American professor from Tulane who has fled the US under a cloud of paranoid suspicion that she is a Communist sympathizer. Through Charis Treat, Szent-Germain meets a group of American academics living away from home, all with similar stigmas attached to their teaching; they call themselves the Ex-Pats' Coven becuase they are the victims of a witch hunt. In America, a CIA bureaucrat, eager for advancement, has come up with a story that will gain him a promotion, one that involves the Ex-Pats' Coven, and Szent-Germain, who has gladly taken manuscripts from Coven members for publication through Eclipse Press, and is suspected of bring a Russian agent. Szent-Germain's relationship with Charis becomes complex, and turns dangerous as the plot of the CIA bureaucrat creates more danger for everyone in the Coven, and Charis Treat is in the most danger of all.

Review: It has been some time since I have read on of Ms. Yarbro's St. Germain books, and her writing is as good as I remembered.

While Sustenance is more contemporary - relatively speaking - than her other books, the storytelling weaves a rich tapestry of characters, time period, and location that makes the reader become a part of the story.

As with other books in the series, Ms. Yarbro brings the time period alive through the characters she writes. I have a nodding acquaintance with the McCarthy inquiries through a couple of classes, but Ms. Yarbro brought a more personal aspect of that time period through the character of Charis Treat and how it affected her home life.

Another great read from a wonderful author.

Received in exchange for an honest review.

(Blurb (c)Chelsea Quinn Yarbro; Image (c)Macmillan)