The Eye of the Virgin »

Dr. Frederick Ramsay was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He received his doctorate from the University of Illinois.  After a stint in the Army, he joined the faculty of the University of Maryland, School of Medicine. In 1971 he was ordained an Episcopal priest. He is the author of several scientific and general articles, tracts, theses, and co-author of The Baltimore Declaration. He is an accomplished public speaker and once hosted a television spot, Prognosis, on the evening news for WMAR-TV, Baltimore. He is also an iconographer with works displayed around the world. He lives in Surprise, Arizona with his wife and partner, Susan.

On the same evening that a body is found in Picketsville’s urgent care clinic, a mysterious break-in occurs at the house of one of Callend University’s faculty. Both seem to be connected to an icon, The Virgin of Tenderness, in the faculty member’s possession. The fact that the body is that of the faculty member’s ex-wife’s lover who, more interestingly seems to have entered the country under an assumed name only complicates things for Sherriff Ike Schwartz.

In the search for killers and thieves, what appears to be outdated spycraft, a microdot, is found on the icon. In an era of sophisticated cyber-encrypted information transfer, the presence of this bit of CIA nostalgia brings in Charlie Garland and the forces from Langley.

Ike has no wish to engage with them or their problems. He has killers to apprehend and sets out to do his job in spite of the meddling by government agencies. That the bit of spycraft is something more than old time microphotography and it carried information that implicates the involvement of Israel’s super secret Mossad only complicates an already messy set of problems.

A dead CIA agent, a rogue handler, and a potential international incident are avoided outside the faculty member’s house as the good, the bad, and the ugly are neatly sorted and carted away.

During the course of all this, Ruth’s mother arrives for an extended visit, Ike and Ruth are officially engaged, and the Sutherlins, Billy, Frank, and Essie, like Dilsey Gibson, endure.

Publishers Weekly

Picketsville, Va., sheriff Ike Schwartz investigates a botched robbery at the home of Louis Dakis, a professor at Callend University, where Ike’s lady friend, Ruth Harris, happens to be president, in Ramsay’s absorbing sixth mystery to feature the dogged lawman (after 2008’s Choker). Though it appears nothing was taken during the break-in, a dead body turns up around the same time, propped in the local hospital’s emergency room. Convinced the two cases are related, Ike digs into Louis’s life and finds a bitterly estranged wife, a missing lover, and several religious icons, one recently brought into the country. Ike soon has dozens of questions, no answers, and an itch to learn more about a particular icon called The Virgin of Tenderness. With folksy charm and dollops of humor, Ramsay crafts a tale of international intrigue in which the past and present make poor bedfellows. Fans of Ruth and Ike’s blossoming romance will find plenty to cheer about. (July)