The Tangled Web

Although surrounded by professional detectives, in "The Tangled Web," amateur sleuth, the lynch-pin who must weave together contradictory evidence is Megan Parke. A professional actress and drama instructor, she relies on her theatrical knowledge, instinctively turning to improvisation to discover hidden truths. As sole director of this real-life mystery, she is in a position which allows thinking outside the very box which constrains and restricts the professional investigators who often find themselves ensnared in an uncooperative turf battle. But, for Megan, this is more than a simple role of detective because it is not art but her very life at stake. She is not on stage, but on a desperate drive to safeguard her only family. Prologue sets tone with behind-the-scene manipulations of a realistic, though eccentric jury. The murder mystery, which will culminate in jury’s verdict, springs from conflict and clashes of characters embroiled as both victims and perpetrators of fraudulent schemes. Not a formula whodunit! As story unfolds, intricate puzzles consist of different questions: Who will actually be murdered; how and where will the deed, or deeds, by accomplished? Later, puzzling search for killer, or killers, with full-circle return to prologue: will an innocent be found guilty in the jury’s rushed judgment in order to return to their lives in paradise? Sub-tile, "Florida Sunset Murder," indicates setting: peek inside exclusive society, playground for wealth and privilege, where deep desire for privacy extends to surrounding community. For some it may be paradise found, or is it lost, or perhaps regained? From outset, reader knows it is tale of “rich, infamous, and other folk.” How do they cope in this unique town? It is described as one “which ate money and went to lunch on unwary who had it. First the town would beguile; next some would become infected by a peculiar virus with the main symptom being an insatiable yen for more and more material things to demonstrate one’s superiority, or at least one’s belonging to the invisible club.”