This book is written by one of the producers of As the World Turns, one of the longer running American soaps, but it is presented as if it was written by one of the characters in the show. Those of you who watch the show, know that Henry Coleman is the funny everyman about town. He has generally shifted from job to job and interacted with just about every character by being a manny (male nanny), a chauffeur, a diner owner, and an investigator.

It is this last job that is going to place him and his Swedish-born girlfriend Vienna Hyatt in the center of an international kidnapping case that is going to draw from characters and plots that have been at the core of the show for decades.

Lucinda Walsh, the well-known business woman in town that built a successful company left to her by her dead husband into an international conglomerate, decides to hire Henry to search for her missing granddaughter Lucy. A few years ago Lucy, who was a new doctor, ran off with her newborn brother Johnny to protect him from the competitive machinations of his father, the despicable Craig Montgomery, and his uncle, the mildly crazy Paul Ryan. While both men care for Johnny and would love to be a good father to them because of their love for his mother Jennifer, who died, their competition would likely ruin all of that. Our unlikely hero, Henry takes on the case and is joined by the beautiful Vienna.

As you can probably guess, Henry and Vienna are not the only ones looking for Lucy. They continually run into Craig and Paul as they search in the (fictional) Republic of Montega in South Africa, Vienna's homeland Sweden, the United Nations in New York, and even in nearby Chicago. It is only with the help of Johnny's relatives (Margo and Tom Hughes, Sierra Esteban, Gwen and Will Munson, and even the cousins/twins Frannie and Sabrina Hughes) as well as other former characters on the show that Vienna and Henry stay one step ahead of Craig and Paul.

Adams does a great job of capturing the tone of the many characters sprinkled throughout the book. She also is able to provide highlighted details about the history that readers will need to understand how everyone in Oakdale is inter-related (and, boy, are they ever). It is also a nice blend of humor and action that keeps the story moving.

It is a good story, but readers will definitely need to have background information by being a regular viewer of the show if he or she wants to not be totally lost by what is going on.