Body Work on Pennsylvania Avenue
A 1963 Baltimore Mystery

About this book:

In the neon-lit heart of 1963 West Baltimore, Pennsylvania Avenue pulses with jazz, ambition, and secrets the white police force refuses to touch. Loretta Mercer knows every one of them. At thirty-four, she runs Mercer & Sons Funeral Home with precision and grace, embalming the neighbors the city would rather forget—and keeping a private ledger of the wounds that don't match the official stories.

When deacon Arthur Vance turns up "accidentally" fallen down a cellar stairs, Loretta spots the puncture wound behind his ear, the blue wool fibers under his nails, and the three hundred dollars in missing church funds. Detective Ryan smells of rye and writes it off as a drunk's misfortune. But Loretta's basement table doesn't lie, and the tailor's uncle on Fremont Avenue holds a lead punch that matches the kill shot perfectly.

From the Sphinx Club's ruby glow to the shadowed alleys behind the Royal Theater, Loretta walks a thin line between the living and the dead, the powerful and the forgotten. With a sharp eye, a locked drawer of evidence, and a community that protects its own, she'll trace the money, the motive, and the murderer—before the next body lands on her table with its mouth sewn shut.