Exquisite Cadavers

This is an invitation to a journey. To step outside yourself. To a faraway island. Lemons. Tobacco. Vanilla. Sunburnt skin and saltwater. A real fucking scorcher. And an eroticism unfolding itself to secret promises and long-held desires.

Sicily.

The teardrop of the Italian peninsula is undergoing change from within. A battle for the bodies and souls of its inhabitants pegs powerbroker against powerbroker. But it's not all about political influence, old-school Mafia connections, and secret transnational organizations. This is a land of long-held superstitions - the mystical fog of paganism which surrounds the city of Palermo can bend Time itself. And the influence of the Catholic Church - the original powerbroker - grips the shores mercilessly as it heals from an explosive sex scandal.

Well, now...this is all news to Parsifal Blake, veteran New York City Detective whose heart is full of regret after a recent tragedy. He embarks on a brief summer vacation to Palermo only to witness the bodies of three teenage girls get pulled from the waters of the Tyrrhenian Sea by fishermen gathering their nets early in the morning, following the city's most important religious festival. Something impels Parsifal to investigate - in an unofficial capacity.

Just like something impelled him to escape New York - at least for a bit. Just for a bit.

A message in a bottle hanging off the beautiful young neck of one of the victims is made public. It reads:
I CONFESS TO ALMIGHTY GOD, TO THE BLESSED MARY EVER VIRGIN ---- AND TO YOU, FATHER, THAT EXCEEDINGLY IN THOUGHT...IN WORD...IN DEED... I HAVE SINNED, I HAVE SINNED, I HAVE SINNED

An excerpt - from Latin Mass. The Catholic Church is immediately implicated in the heinous triple murders. And the God-fearing, hard-working public demands Blood. It exacts payment for what has been done to its innocent daughters. But, under the surface of the Tyrrhenian lie mysteries Neptune himself cannot solve. Perhaps only an outsider can get the job done. But Sicily - as Parsifal Blake will find out, alongside fresh friends and newfound enemies - can be as much misleading in her promise as she is beautiful in her wilderness.