The Navigator’s Daughter is the first book in Nancy Cole Silverman’s Kat Lawson Mystery series.
Katarina Lynn Lawson receives a phone call from her father. He’s received a letter from a man named Sandor Zselnegeller claiming he’s found the war plane that crashed in Hungary during WW2. Kat’s dad was a navigator/bombardier during WW2.
Kat’s dad has cancer and cannot travel so he asks his daughter to go to Hungary to photograph the last resting place of the plane as well as to search for the mother-son duo who rescued and saved him from the Nazis. Kat believes Sandor is a scammer and this is all an elaborate plot but agrees to pay a visit to the crash site.
As Kat reaches Budapest airport, she’s received by Sandor. There’s something hinky about him and Kat doesn’t want to trust him. He’s booked a room for her in one of his friend’s place. But soon, Kat starts to wonder if she’s being set up for something worse…
Wowza! This series debut was so, so, so good! I read it in one sitting. From start to finish, I was hooked on to the story. To be honest, I didn’t want the story to end.
First things first, I loved the war setting. There’s WW2 – Kat’s dad was a navigator and we have lots of information about the Nazi occupation of Hungary, from German soldiers causing trouble to Nazi propaganda, and innocent jews being sent to concentration camps. Then, we have the cold war setting. Rather, the first couple of years after the dissolution of USSR. The Russians might have left but things are still tense.
There’s a whole lot of snooping and spying. Kat does not believe Sandor’s being honest with her. He takes her to the fortress where her father had stayed hidden for a week or two, but Kat feels he’s being secretive about something. Then, she finds her houseowner (the family’s she’s currently living with) snooping on her things.
Kat wants to go in search of Katarina and Adolph, the mother-son duo who rescued her dad. Though Sandor initially promised to help, his promise falls apart soon after.
From start to finish, this book is full of suspense. This is a well-researched book. I cannot not mention the fact that though this story is completely fictional, it all began when the author’s dad (WW2 vet) received a letter from DoD saying a young Hungarian man had found his plane. This is how The Navigator’s Daughter begins. The rest is purely fictional. Honestly, this felt like a real-life experience rather than fiction. Credit goes to Nancy for writing a make-believe story. 🙂
We also have a bit of Kat’s background story – losing her first husband to Vietnam war, separation from her second husband, an embarrassing affair with her boss which led to losing her reporter job and nobody hiring her. Some development on the husband angle as the story proceeds. There’s also a shocking revelation at the end – I didn’t see it coming.
Excellent series-plot setting and character introduction. The Navigator’s Daughter is written by a master storyteller. Nancy Cole Silverman, you have a new fan follower here! I absolutely loved every bit of this book. If you are looking for an engrossing, unique and riveting mystery, I highly recommend The Navigator’s Daughter by Nancy Cole Silverman.
I received an ARC from Book Sirens and Nancy Cole Silverman in exchange for an honest and unbiased opinion.
The Book Decoder 
Wow! What a review!
Thank you😊😊