Ethan Holmes

Author of The Keystone, Earth’s Blood, A Multi-Pack of Brain Flakes, Live Your Life in a Crap Free Zone and Shorts and Other Laundry

Being a private investigator isn't easy. Being a private investigator and a used-to-be cop hated by his former colleagues is worse. Being all that and a bag of potato chips in a run-down, boring, coal-scarred city like Scranton is my own personal hell. Still, a man's gotta' work, right?

My name is Titus Kofi; and kindly don't pronounce it like the damn drink. I took this gig working at The Keystone Hotel. What can I say? It pays the bills. The owners, a greedy bunch of locals who are all part of one not-so-happy family and just so happen to make up the board of directors, are fairly certain that someone is stealing their precious cash from the hotel. Their kingpin, Violetta Carbona, one of the strangest looking women you'll ever meet, wants me to find out who so they can hang the poor bastard from the nearest leafless, half-dead tree. Well, that and she wants to keep the money flowing at The Keystone.

There's just one problem; there's no money missing from the cash drawer of The Keystone. There are some missing residents though and it's not just because they didn't take their medicine and forgot where they lived. No, someone's playing some deadly games here; games like bird-caging, riding the gargoyle, and one-way elevator rides. To make matters worse the idiots I used to work with are zooming in on all the wrong people trying to make the pieces fit the puzzle so they can go home with a beer and a smile. That's why they arrested Mike despite the fact that he's Violetta's nephew. That's where I come in.

Suddenly I find myself caught up in this little ball of fun and I don't like it one bit. I don't much care for being Ms. Carbona's pawn or anyone else's for that matter. I'm going to get to the bottom of this one way or another, or end up on the bottom of something.

This title was featured on The Indie Spotlight home page on January 15, 2011. Click the link below to check it out.