The Year of the Goat
(2026)(The second book in the Telegraph Hill Mystery series)
A novel by Lila Blake
A stolen story. A grand unveiling. A death in the smoke of the dragon’s finale.
San Francisco chef Renzo Castagna has built an empire on a beloved family legend: an old North Beach trattoria, a grandmother’s recipes, and a corner of Columbus Avenue the city thinks it remembers.
Vivian Salvatore remembers something else.
The woman at the stove was Nettie Figone, whose name has been polished out of the story Renzo is about to sell to the world. When a storage unit burns and Nettie’s papers vanish, Vivian starts asking questions. Some recipes were borrowed. Some debts were kept in pencil. And some people have waited a long time for the truth.
Then, on the night of San Francisco’s Chinese New Year parade, as firecrackers burst and the Golden Dragon passes, Renzo Castagna dies at the door of his own grand unveiling.
Now Vivian must untangle stolen recipes, family silence, old grief, and a murder hidden in plain sight.
The Year of the Goat is the second Telegraph Hill Mystery: a warm, atmospheric San Francisco cozy mystery with an older amateur sleuth, neighborhood secrets, culinary history, and a fair-play puzzle rooted in who gets remembered — and who gets erased.
Genre: Mystery
San Francisco chef Renzo Castagna has built an empire on a beloved family legend: an old North Beach trattoria, a grandmother’s recipes, and a corner of Columbus Avenue the city thinks it remembers.
Vivian Salvatore remembers something else.
The woman at the stove was Nettie Figone, whose name has been polished out of the story Renzo is about to sell to the world. When a storage unit burns and Nettie’s papers vanish, Vivian starts asking questions. Some recipes were borrowed. Some debts were kept in pencil. And some people have waited a long time for the truth.
Then, on the night of San Francisco’s Chinese New Year parade, as firecrackers burst and the Golden Dragon passes, Renzo Castagna dies at the door of his own grand unveiling.
Now Vivian must untangle stolen recipes, family silence, old grief, and a murder hidden in plain sight.
The Year of the Goat is the second Telegraph Hill Mystery: a warm, atmospheric San Francisco cozy mystery with an older amateur sleuth, neighborhood secrets, culinary history, and a fair-play puzzle rooted in who gets remembered — and who gets erased.
Genre: Mystery