Bøger af Mark de Castrique

When old Birdie Campbell dies, many in the NC mountain town of Ridgetop are not particularly sorrowed by her passing. But McAdams & Son Funeral Home still has to plan a service and find someone willing to say good things about the dearly departed. Birdie's death unleashes a string of events that threaten to destroy not only the civility of her service, but the funeral home itself. Stage Play presented as part of The New Plays in America and New Voices of the South series.

The summer of 2020. COVID-19 is spreading like wildfire. Racial reckoning and Confederate monuments fuel nationwide protests. And Asheville, North Carolina, is not immune.When Sam Blackman and Nakayla Robertson see an elderly man knocked to the pavement by a Confederate sympathizer, they rush to his aid. The assailant runs away and the fatally injured man struggles to say, "I'm so sorry, Nakayla. Can you forgive me?" Nakayla has never seen him before. Why does he want her forgiveness?Nakayla learns the man, Henry Nelson, was a retired homicide detective who had investigated her father's death fifteen years earlier. He'd closed the case as a suicide. But when Nelson's widow brings Nakayla the case files her husband stole from police records, she and Sam realize the old man had been reviewing the investigation, evidently questioning his earlier conclusions.But then the detective's widow is murdered and Sam and Nakayla find themselves confronting a killer who will stop at nothing to keep a crime from the past buried in the past. Their only clue, a declassified FBI file that J. Edgar Hoover kept on Martin Luther King, Jr. A file that detailed threats against the civil rights leader during his trips to Asheville. A file found on the desk of Nakayla's father the night he died. A file that holds the key to the secret. The Secret of FBI File 100-3-116.

"This urgent, cleverly plotted high stakes thriller is set in motion by botched attack on two law clerks leaving one dead and the other in a coma. The ensuing cover up leaves a string of bodies and too many players at cross-purposes. It also leaves Chief Justice Clarissa Baxter with a target on her back. We'll need an off the grid hero with friends in high places: enter retired FBI agent-turned-boardinghouse landlady, Ethel Fiona Crestwater (legend) and her double-first-cousin-twice-removed Jesse Cooper (sidekick). Although in her mid-seventies, Ethel is no bumbling amateur sleuth; she's a seasoned pro with razor-sharp instincts and Bond-worthy skills. College-aged Jesse brings tech savvy and boundless enthusiasm, along with an innate talent for intrigue. Together, the unlikely duo will face malicious back-stabbing political sycophants, conniving lobbyists, and a motivated assassin bent on removing the Chief Justice from the equation-- along with Ethel, who stands defiantly between the hitman and his payday."--

Everybody has something to hideAt 75-years-old, Ethel Fiona Crestwater is used to being underestimated. She looks like someone's grandma, though she's never married or had children; petite and a bit frail, she's not a threat to anyone. Or is she...? Ethel runs a boarding house for government agents, and when someone murders one of her boarders, she springs into action-much to the surprise of her distant cousin Jesse, who has recently come to stay with her while he attends university. As he watches her photograph the crime scene, conceal evidence, and speed-dial the Secret Service Director, Jesse realizes that there's much more to Ethel than appearances suggest.But when Jesse is assaulted and the gym bag full of cash Ethel had hidden is stolen from the basement, the pair decides it's time to launch their own unofficial investigation. With no one to trust but each other, these double-first-cousins-twice-removed form an unlikely bond, and learn that the only thing truly worth risking your life for is family.

A river gives up its dead, but not its secrets...Sam Blackman and Nakayla Robertson, private investigators in Asheville, North Carolina, are hired when a local environmentalist dies while monitoring water quality in the nearby Pigeon River. With no soil or water samples found near the body, his widow doesn't believe his death was an accident.In fact, witnesses reported a public altercation between the environmentalist and local mill heir Luke Kirkpatrick just two days prior. Could Luke or his father, Ted, have committed murder to secure their proposed business expansion? Meanwhile, preparations for a local festival suffer violent setbacks, and the investigators worry the events are related. Can Sam and Nakayla identify the killer and serve justice before Asheville is threatened once again?The eighth book featuring Private Investigators Blackman and Robertson, Fatal Scores, is a timely mystery perfect for fans private eyes and anyone with a taste for regional history.Blackman Agency Investigations:Blackman's CoffinThe Fitzgerald Ruse The Sandburg ConnectionMurder in Passing

A murder from the past comes creeping into the present, as two private eyes open up a cold case to find a killer, or risk becoming the next targets.