Knock ‘Em Dead

It’s high summer and the Nice Jazz Festival, at which Captain Paul Darac’s group is playing, is just a few days away. That’s the good news. The bad is that his on-off love affair with fellow officer Frankie, appears to be off for good: her feelings have cooled. So Darac has much on his mind as the team is called to the death of an elderly man at St-Laurent rail station. The victim is identified as hard-bitten ex-comedy star Ambroise Paillaud, born locally and only recently returned to the area. Intrigue: Darac learns that the village to which Paillaud retired had pitilessly expelled his family when he was a boy. More intriguing still, his will reveals that he left his vast fortune to the village. Gradually, Darac will untie a knot of greed, corruption, blackmail and murder which exposes Paillaud’s true plan, and which brings other malign forces to the surface.

“My favourite foreign detective created by a Brit since the late Michael Dibdin gave us Aurelio Zen.”  Mike Ripley on the Darac series, Shots E-zine, December 2018

“Pin sharp: A winner from page one”. Jim Kelly, December 2019

Author

Peter Morfoot’s writing credits include plays and sketch shows for BBC radio and TV, and the “cult classic” (Time Out) satirical novel, Burksey. He has lectured on film, holds a PhD in Art History, and has spent 30 years exploring life on the French Riviera, the setting for his crime series featuring Captain Paul Darac of Nice’s Brigade Criminelle. The first Darac Mystery, Impure Blood, was U.S. Library Journal’s Pick of the Month for April 2016; the second, Fatal Music, was listed in Strand Magazine’s Top 25 Books of 2017; and award-winning critic Mike Ripley selected both Fatal Music and the third novel, Box of Bones for his 5 Crime Picks of 2017 and 2018 respectively (Shots E-zine).

Knock ‘em Dead is the 4^th Captain Darac mystery. The first three, Impure Blood, Fatal Music, and Box of Bones were published by Titan Books.