Where Brood the Grieving Skies

In the latest historical mystery featuring real-life aviation pioneers Wilbur and Orville Wright, their equally inventive sister Katharine must get to the bottom of a disaster that threatens their high-flying dreams . . .

Fall 1908. The Wright Brothers are broadening their horizons. While Wilbur is in France demonstrating their practical airplane to the governments of Europe, Orville, with his two trusty engineers, is in Virgina at Fort Myer, giving flying demonstrations to the U.S. Army.

After several successful flights, the Army requests that Orville take up Lieutenant Thomas Selfridge next. Orville is not pleased. At 185 pounds, not only is Selfridge the heaviest person to go up in the airplane, but he is also a member of the Aerial Experiment Association (AEA), a group of aviators formed by Alexander Graham Bell. The Wrights suspect the AEA is spying on them for information. Still, Orville must comply.

Tragically, something goes wrong in the air and the airplane plummets. Selfridge is killed, the first airplane crash fatality in history. Orville is badly hurt and Katharine rushes from Ohio to be by his side.

When a fellow patient at Fort Myer, an injured Army electrician, unexpectedly dies, Katharine’s suspicions are aroused. Freddie Warwick was young, healing well, and scheduled to go home the next day. The Army is oddly unconcerned, but Katharine is not. When she discovers that Freddie had ties to the AEA, she realizes his death might be connected to the organization—and worse, to the lethal crash. Now Katharine must unearth the truth, before her family is grounded for good . . .