01932cam a2200349 i 4500 496828986 TxGeo 20210319120000.0 161226s2017||||||||||||||||||||||||eng|u 9781328745590 trade pbk. 1328745597 trade pbk. TxGeo rda Griffiths, Elly. Smoke and mirrors / Elly Griffiths. First Mariner Books edition. Boston, MA : Mariner Books, 2017. 338 pages ; 21 cm. txt rdacontent n rdamedia nc rdacarrier Stephens and Mephisto mystery ; 2 "First published in Great Britain in 2015 by Quercus."--Title page verso. "It's Christmastime in Brighton, and the city is abuzz about magician Max Mephisto's star turn in Aladdin. But the holiday cheer is lost on DI Edgar Stephens. He's investigating the murder of two children, Annie and Mark, who were found in the woods alongside a trail of candy--a horrifying scene eerily reminiscent of "Hansel and Gretel." Edgar has plenty of leads. Annie, a dark child, wrote gruesome plays based on the Grimms' fairy tales. Does the key to the case lie in her final script? Or does the macabre staging of the bodies point to the theater and the capricious cast of Aladdin? Edgar enlists Max's help in penetrating the shadowy world of the theater. But is this all just classic misdirection?"-- Unedited summary from page 4 of cover. 20210329. Magicians Fiction. Serial murder investigation Fiction. Brighton (England) Fiction. Detective and mystery fiction. Historical fiction. Stephens and Mephisto mystery ; 2. QS5