Interesting characters and a good flow. ( )

The Eye of the Virgin is the sixth book in Ramsay's Ike Schwartz Mysteries series. Ike is former CIA operative who is now Sheriff of a university town called Picketsville. Ike has a full and happy life, with a Sheriff's Department to run and a feisty girlfriend to spar with. What appears at first to simply be a busy day at the office, with a break-in and a murder to investigate, quickly becomes a complex case involving the FBI, CIA, and even Mossad.

There is no need to have read the previous Ike Schwartz books to understand what is going on here. Ramsay has created an interesting genre; half cozy mystery and half international spy thriller. The cozy mystery half wins, with appealing, quirky characters and settings, and a gentle hero in Ike Schwartz. But the narrative is pushed along by the complicated plot involving double identities and operatives-gone-rogue. I enjoyed reading The Eye of the Virgin because it was dominated by the mystery itself, but I must admit that I got a little bit lost at times!

I enjoyed that fact that Ramsay has given his lead character, Ike, a wide range of interests. The passages in The Eye of the Virgin involving iconography were particularly interesting to me, adding another layer to the novel. Ramsay is himself a medical doctor, an ordained priest and an iconographer as well as an author! I suspect he has some measure of desire to add "small town sheriff" to that list, but is making do by living vicariously through Ike!

An enjoyable read for cozy mystery lovers who are looking for something with a bit more meat.