✍ Scribed by George Baxt
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
“It needs something.” Hitch stared out the window as they passed St Peter's Church, which dated from the eleventh century. Alma waited. She was soon rewarded. His face lit up. “I know what we need. We need a marvelous, brutal, bloody murder! The gorier the better. " The taxi driver cringed and narrowly avoided hitting a pedestrian.
Alma's shoulders sagged. “Now how do I work a murder into a story of two chorus girls in a music hall? Have you a clue?"
“If I had a clue, we'd have a murder."
In this stunning new novel by George Baxt, Alfred Hitchcock gets his murder—two, in fact—but with few clues. It is 1925, and Hitch and his wife are discussing the script for his new film, The Pleasure Garden, which they are currently shooting in Munich. It is the set for this film that becomes the stage for just the sort of “brutal, bloody” murder Hitch describes— only this one is quite unpleasantly real. There are no leads to follow, except evidence that the murder weapon had been used the previous night in the grisly stabbing of yet another member of the ill-fated film’s staff—and a curiously catchy and persistent melody last played by the murdered pianist.
Eleven years and twenty films later, the Munich murders are still unsolved. Hitchcock, who is living with Alma in London, has begun to win international acclaim as a writer of spy thrillers. He is working on The Lady Vanishes when he receives a mysterious phone call from the past that thrusts the ever-expanding director into the role of the pursued—wanted for a crime he did not commit—in a chase worthy of a scene from one of his own films.
Studded with plot detail from Hitchcock’s many films and featuring the famous director himself in this ingenious and stylish thriller, The Alfred Hitchcock Murder Case is a treat for Hitchcock fans and George Baxt fans alike.
Historical Mystery
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