A Declaration of Murder
Mary Ann Paul
Type: ARC
Genre: Historical fiction
Word count: 73,200
March 1920. Petra Wood is preparing to open an exclusive Berkshire resort when a notorious strikebreaker comes knocking. Hours later, he is dead, with a cryptic message written beside him in his own blood. The police have a convincing case against Petra’s friend. If Petra cannot discover what the dead man’s message means, a little boy may lose his mother.
What's this?
Petra Wood has finally made a new life for herself. Saving her friend may cost all of it.
It’s March 1920, and the twenty-three-year-old suffragist is preparing to open an exclusive resort in the Berkshire Mountains with her celebrated partner, Miss Van Cleef. But money is running short, the staff refuses to recognize Petra’s authority, and their first guest has yet to book a room.
Then Raymond Glover comes knocking. Glover is a professional strikebreaker. From one mill town to the next, he crushes resistance and leaves a long line of enemies behind. Within hours of his appearance at the resort, he is found murdered, a cryptic message written beside him in his own blood.
But the police aren’t interested in solving riddles. They have a case against Petra’s friend. Unless Petra finds the real killer, a little boy will lose his mother.
Every conversation uncovers another reason someone wanted Glover dead—and another lie meant to keep Petra from learning why. As her search leads from a bitter labor dispute to an elite college campus, Petra refuses to stop asking questions, even as they undermine the resort’s chances of success and her still-new relationship with High Child.
Glover left three bloody letters. Petra needs to survive long enough to understand what they mean.
Mary Ann Paul is an Amazon bestselling and award-winning author who is also the creative alter ego of Paula De Santiago.
Paula grew up in the foothills of the picturesque Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts, where history lingers in tossed stone walls. A Harvard-trained researcher and Fulbright scholar, she learned the art of mystery-solving at her grandfather’s kitchen table, listening to the seasoned police detective tell unfiltered stories of crime, power, and corruption.
She has hitchhiked through Japan, survived a stampede in China, and climbed the Himalaya, but considers the hidden intrigue woven into New England’s landscapes as the most exciting vista this world offers.
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