Passion and Peril on the Silk Road: A Thriller in Pakistan and China

A tumultuous international journey, full of art crime, intrigue and perilous acts of love. It starts with murder in Manhattan. Before long, Nellie Mackenzie and Taylor Jackson find themselves at opposite ends of the Karakoram Highway. Nellie is headed north through tribal Pakistan, where vengeance killings are a way of life. Jackson is headed south along the desert routes of western China, where smuggling national treasures is a capital offense. Nellie and Jackson are antiquities dealers. They were once husband and wife. Now the unsolved murder lies between them. Making their way across the vast historic landscapes of Central Asia, their companions are murderers, lovers, and a treasure trove of Tang Dynasty statuary. Everyone on this modern Silk Road is seeking justice for betrayals they've suffered. No one knows where their sense of honor will take them. Death lurks at every turn. Susan Barrett Price sketched scenes for this novel during her own road trip through Central Asia. She and her future husband endured landslides, village lockdowns, and cold-water shangri-las... bought ancient beads and carpets from refugees... survived being conned and being arrested. Price discovered that traveling the borderline between wonder and insanity creates the most anxious characters and the most chilling plots.

Antiquities dealers--and former spouses--Nellie Mackenzie and Taylor Jackson are at opposite ends of the Karakoram Highway. Nellie is headed north through tribal Pakistan, where vengeance killings are a way of life, and Jackson is headed south where smuggling national treasures is a capital offense. An unsolved murder lies between them.