A Director Cut is author Simon Parke's third Abbot Peter Mystery; mixing more macabre wit and mystery as Peter and Tamsin seek to discover the murderer lurking among in the cast or stage-crew of Stornhaven's latest amateur theatrical production.
The theatre is dark and hushed. Quiet piano music plays as the curtains of the Bell theatre open for the second half of Mother's Day; a new play by the young playwright Paul Pleasant.
On the stage , the light reveals a chair face to audience in which the lone figure of an old lady sits. She does not look out, however but looks up.
Bathed in a gentle light, she gazes heavenwards, head thrown back, dramatic in pose looking up at the lights, mouth open as though in motionless wonder. Her body pitched forward and her head yanked back, simultaneously separating the vertebrae, as the pathologist would later say. And her throat was cut.
"It's Herione," says Pete. "And I don't believe this was in the script."
About the Author:
Simon Parke is a writer, therapist and retreat giver. In a previous life, he wrote scripts for Spitting Image, won a Sony radio script award and was a priest in the Church of England. A former columnist for the Daily Mail, a former supermarket worker, a present columnist for the Church Times and author of many books, including Pippa's Progress, A Pilgrim's Journey to Heaven.