A Fatal Finale

Written by Kathleen Marple Kalb

Narrated by Amy Melissa Bentley

On the cusp of the twentieth century, Manhattan is a lively metropolis buzzing with talent. But after a young soprano meets an untimely end on stage, can one go-getting leading lady hit the right notes in a case of murder?

New York City, 1899. When it comes to show business, Gilded Age opera singer Ella Shane wears the pants. The unconventional diva breaks the mold by assuming "trouser roles"-male characters played by women-and captivating audiences far and wide with her travelling theatre company. But Ella's flair for the dramatic takes a terrifying turn when an overacting Juliet to her Romeo drinks real poison during the final act of Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi.

Weeks after the woman's death is ruled a tragic accident, a mysterious English duke arrives in Greenwich Village on a mission. He's certain someone is getting away with murder, and the refined aristocrat won't travel back across the Atlantic until Ella helps him expose the truth.

As Ella finds herself caught between her craft and a growing infatuation with her dashing new acquaintance, she's determined to decode the dark secrets surrounding her costar's fatale finale-before the lights go dark and the culprit appears for an encore . . .

• Language: English
• Publisher: Highbridge Company
• Release date: Apr 28, 2020
• ISBN: 9781684578405

Kathleen Marple Kalb

Kathleen Marple Kalb likes to describe herself as an Author/Anchor/Mom...not in that order. An award-winning radio journalist, she currently anchors on the weekend morning show at New York's #1 news station, 1010 WINS. She's the author of several mysteries, historical and contemporary. Her short stories appear in anthologies and online and have been short-listed for Derringer and Black Orchid Novella Awards. She grew up in front of a microphone and a keyboard, working as an overnight DJ as a teenager in her hometown of Brookville, Pennsylvania...and writing her first (thankfully unpublished) novel at sixteen. When her son started kindergarten, she returned to fiction, and after two failed projects, some 200 rejections, and a family health crisis, found an agent for the third book-leading to a pandemic debut. In hopes of sharing what she's learned the hard way, she's active in writers' groups, including Sisters in Crime and the Short Mystery Fiction Society, and keeps a weekly writing survival tips blog. She, her husband, and their son live in Connecticut in a house owned by their cat.