... in 1861, Detective Paul Picard, of the Paris Police, is hot on the trail of Baron Mantes, who has a penchant for murdering young wmoen and leaving their decapitated bodies at the scene of the crime. Recovering from his most recent run-in with the Baron, from which Picard emerges decidedly the worse for wear, he attends a party given by a wealthy and mysterious immigrant named Ric Lazare, of dubious origins, and his fabulously beautiful wife, Renee Lazare. The party is attended by all of upper-class Paris and the draw is a fortune-telling machine which holds all the guests mesmerized. Invited into a private room which holds the famous machine, Picard finds himself hurled headlong into a web of gypsy magic, murder, seduction and mystery that leads him through Germany to Austria, the Hungarian steppes, and back to Paris, to confront his fate before the fortune telling machine. His fortune, Fata Morgana, is, like Ric and Renee Lazare, a shimmering mirage, irresistable, unknowable, and ultimately unreachable; one can only accept it as it is. Kotzwinkle has woven a magical story that holds us entranced to the very last page.