Murder on Center Stage


Book Description




Murder, Center Stage


Book Description

“A razor-sharp delight! . . . a wonderful and witty mash-up of murder mystery and onstage/offstage intrigue.” — Tom Ford, director and Equity actor (Sweeney Todd) Imagine an Agatha Christie whodunit set to a Stephen Sondheim soundtrack. Asher Kaufman doesn’t have to—because he’s living it. In this laugh-out-loud funny backstage tale (a sequel to All the World’s a Stage Fright), our hero—a fallible local theater critic—once again finds himself in an uncomfortable role: acting in a professional stage production so he can write about the experience for his newspaper, the Cleveland Jewish Chronicle. This time, the show is the angry, bloody, and brilliant musical Sweeney Todd. And in addition to mastering the musical’s famously challenging lyrics and performing its dark, enigmatic melodies, Asher finds himself in the middle of an unscripted, onstage, opening night murder. The police detective leading the investigation is a no-nonsense crime solver but a fish out of water in the world of theater, so she asks Asher to be her cultural advisor on the case. Now, he must help find out which of his quirky castmates is a killer. They all claim innocence, but as Asher knows firsthand, they could just be acting.




Murder For Two


Book Description

Officer Marcus Moscowicz is a small town policeman with dreams of making it to detective. One fateful night, shots ring out at the surprise birthday party of Great American Novelist Arthur Whitney and the writer is killed…fatally. With the nearest detective an hour away, Marcus jumps at the chance to prove his sleuthing skills—with the help of his silent partner, Lou. But whodunit? Did Dahlia Whitney, Arthur's scene-stealing wife, give him a big finish? Is Barrette Lewis, the prima ballerina, the prime suspect? Did Dr. Griff, the overly-friendly psychiatrist, make a frenemy? Marcus has only a short amount of time to find the killer and make his name before the real detective arrives… and the ice cream melts!




Center Stage


Book Description

Ten years ago, Magnolia Steele fled Franklin, Tennessee after an incident that left her with hazy memories and a horror of the place where she had been born and bred. Though her abrupt departure destroyed most of her treasured relationships, she vowed never to return . . . until she has no choice. When Magnolia's breakout acting role in a Broadway musical ends in disgrace, there's only one place she can go. She finds herself on her momma's porch, suitcase in hand. Drama follows Magnolia around like a long lost friend. She reluctantly agrees to help her momma's catering company at a party for a country music star, only to find herself face-to-face with a sleazy music agent from her past. After a very public spat, Magnolia not only finds him dead but herself center stage in the police's investigation. Now she must scramble to prove her innocence, relying on the help of acquaintances old and new. But the longer Magnolia stays in Franklin, the more she remembers about the big bad incident that chased her away. The past might not be finished with her yet, and what she doesn't remember could be her biggest danger.




Act Two


Book Description

For as long as Magnolia Steele can remember, the past has had its hooks in her. Her time as a Broadway actress in New York City was an escape that ended in public humiliation, but now that she's back home in Franklin, Tennessee, she's feeling the grip of the two incidents that stole her innocence. The first was the disappearance of her father when she was a teen, who left home for a meeting and never came back. The other incident...well, her memories have returned, but it's best left where it belongs-in the past. Hoping for closure, Magnolia decides to look into her daddy's cold case. If Magnolia keeps digging, she's not sure she can trust her own momma to help her, let alone her new friends and the police detective who's eager to woo her, but after years of running, she's ready to stand her ground.




Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express


Book Description

Just after midnight, a snowdrift stops the Orient Express in its tracks. The luxurious train is surprisingly full for the time of the year, but by the morning it is one passenger fewer. An American tycoon lies dead in his compartment, stabbed a dozen times, his door locked from the inside. Isolated and with a killer in their midst, detective Hercule Poirot must identify the murderer – in case he or she decides to strike again.




Murder on Cue


Book Description

DIVDIVIn the first book of the Jocelyn O’Roarke series, when a Broadway show’s lead actress is murdered, her understudy must race to find the killer before it’s too late /divDIV Struggling actress Jocelyn “Josh” O’Roarke just got a real offer. Well, something resembling a real offer. Her old friend Austin Frost has written a play for Broadway and cast the glamorous Harriet Weldon as the lead. Not wishing to leave his old friend Josh behind, he has invited her to be Harriet’s understudy. The role of understudy is a difficult one—and it becomes even more so when Harriet turns up dead and the police name Josh their prime suspect./divDIV /divDIVWith the NYPD breathing down her neck, Josh must find the people responsible while ensuring that the show will go on./divDIV /divMurder on Cue is the first book of the Jocelyn O’Roarke mystery series, which also includes First Hit of the Season and Death Mask. /div




Murder Takes Center Stage


Book Description

From USA Today bestselling author Tracy D. Comstock... A new school year is under way, and English teacher turned reluctant amateur sleuth Emily Taylor has been roped into directing Ellington High's fall play production. With the help of the new junior high English teacher, Destiny Willis, their production of Clue is soon ready to take the stage. The students are especially thrilled when James Bodley, a hometown favorite with a rising star on Broadway, agrees to help out at rehearsals. But when the drama king, Bodley, is found murdered-strung up like Mr. Boddy, the play's victim, was supposed to be!-Emily vows to find the person behind this heinous killing. Unfortunately, the list of suspects is as long as her cast roll. Could it be his new love...or her resentful daughter? Or maybe his scorned high school sweetheart? Or was the death less about love and more about his betrayal... possibly of the theater seamstress, baker, or woman from his past? With the days ticking down to the first showing, Emily is under the gun to find out who the real killer is before another murder takes center stage. Schooled in Murder books: Murder is our Mascot - book #1 School's Out for Murder - book #2 Lesson in Fear - short story in the "Killer Beach Reads" collection Murder Takes Center Stage - book #3 "Fun, fast paced, and completely engaging! Tracy D. Comstock's Schooled in Murder series will leave you dying for more!" Gemma Halliday, New York Times bestselling mystery author




A Fatal Overture


Book Description

During the first winter of the twentieth century, Gilded Age trouser diva Ella Shane refuses to dim the lights on her dazzling show business career for marriage—even to a dashing British duke. But the versatile mezzo-soprano may have to put it all on the line once murder takes centerstage . . . New York City, 1900. Renowned opera singer and theatre company owner Ella may have both much to gain and much to lose by getting engaged to her courtly long-distance love, Gil Saint Auburn. But there’s little time for romance or resolutions with Gil’s aristocratic mother and aunts visiting Greenwich Village—especially when the ladies discover a dead man in the bathtub of their hotel suite. The victim’s disturbing background and subsequent demise at the elegant Waverly Place Hotel leave the group puzzled beyond the obvious certainty of an unnatural death. Adding to the confusion and mounting fear, danger explodes through Ella’s close-knit circle after a friend makes a stunning confession and Gil becomes a fresh target for violence. Now, with a London tour run fast approaching, prenuptial worries weighing heavily on her heart, and an intricate Joan of Arc aria to rehearse, can Ella decide what she’s willing to sacrifice before confronting a relentless criminal bent on watching her entire life go up in smoke?




The Murder of the Century


Book Description

The “enormously entertaining” (The Wall Street Journal) account of a shocking 1897 murder mystery that “artfully re-create[s] the era, the crime, and the newspaper wars it touched off” (The New York Times) AN EDGAR NOMINEE FOR BEST FACT CRIME • “Fascinating . . . won’t disappoint readers in search of a book like Erik Larson’s The Devil in the White City.”—The Washington Post On Long Island, a farmer finds a duck pond turned red with blood. On the Lower East Side, two boys discover a floating human torso wrapped tightly in oilcloth. Blueberry pickers near Harlem stumble upon neatly severed limbs in an overgrown ditch. The police are baffled: There are no witnesses, no motives, no suspects. The grisly finds that began on the afternoon of June 26, 1897, plunged detectives headlong into the era’s most perplexing murder mystery. Seized upon by battling media moguls Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst, the case became a publicity circus, as their rival newspapers the World and the Journal raced to solve the crime. What emerged was a sensational love triangle and an even more sensational trial. The Murder of the Century is a rollicking tale—a rich evocation of America during the Gilded Age and a colorful re-creation of the tabloid wars that forever changed newspaper journalism.