The Dagger Before Me

<p>Persephone ‘Percy’ Cole joins the ranks of other gumshoes such as Sam Spade Lew Archer and Phillip Marlowe. This five-foot eleven full-figured gal has the same hard-boiled take-no-prisoners attitude but with a difference. She’s a shamus with a wicked sense of humor and the mother of an eight-year old son. Halloween 1942 finds Percy Cole backstage during the previews of the latest Broadway production of Shakespeare’s <strong>Macbeth</strong>. There’s double double toil and trouble when an actor falls from an overhead catwalk and breaks his neck. Only the latest in a series of catastrophes his death serves to further fuel the lore and superstition surrounding the Scottish play and its supernatural force since the play's creation in 1606. With a shortage of ‘man’ power due to the war overseas the desperate producer takes a chance on the female PI to save the show from closing. But everyone has their secrets from the director on down to the lowliest spear thrower. One more murder and a near death scene for Percy and she’s not sure which is worse – that someone is trying to kill her or being foisted into the role of Witch Number Two. Armed with her noodle and a WWI German Mauser Persephone Cole will make things right because that’s what lady dicks do.</p>