Artscape — Frederick Ramsay

With a Foreword by Frederick Ramsay

"Ramsay nicely mixes town and gown, sophisticates and rustics, thugs and masterminds. Ike Schwartz seems destined for a bright future." -- Publishers Weekly

Ike Schwartz is the new sheriff of Picketsville, Virginia. He's also trying to shake the demons of his past, the memories of a day that went horribly wrong in Switzerland.

Aside from its Civil War history, Picketsville's one claim to fame is Callend College -- a private women's school on the edge of town. The college is most notable for housing half of the billion dollar Dillon art collection, a treasure secured in an underground bunker originally built in the 1950s as a super bomb shelter. Its alarm system is state of the art.

But is it? Could a determined and ruthless group get away with stealing the paintings and statuary and then ransom it back for millions? The fanatics have a plan that will spell bad news for the new college president, for Sheriff Schwartz, and for a pair of college students caught in the local Lover's Lane at just the wrong moment.