We’re thrilled to be revealing the cover for Rick Bleiweiss’s Pignon Scorbion & the Barbershop Detectives, which releases February 8th 2022 from Blackstone Publishing.
This is the first novel in a new cozy mystery series featuring Pignon Scorbion, an exacting and idiosyncratic inspector investigating mysteries in a quaint village in Edwardian England with the help of his barbershop friends.
Pignon Scorbion is available to pre-order from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Bookshop.org. Read on to discover the cover, synopsis, and what Rick thought when he first saw it!
“After seeing the fabulous cover that Kathryn G. English designed for Pignon Scorbion & the Barbershop Detectives it’s been like torture not being able to show it to anyone. It so captures the feel and look of 1910 rural countryside England and the classic historical fiction mystery “whodunit” novel that the book is, that it’s the perfect cover for what’s inside. And on top of that, it incorporates key elements from the crimes that Scorbion and his colorful group of amateur sleuths solve – the pig, the hatchet, the circus tent, the barber pole. I can’t wait to walk into bookstores and see it on their shelves, both in the new release area, and also sitting alongside Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes in the mysteries section.”
SYNOPSIS
The year is 1910, and in the small and seemingly sleepy English municipality of Haxford, there’s a new chief police inspector. At first, the dapper and unflappable Pignon Scorbion strikes something of an odd figure among the locals, who don’t see a need for such an exacting investigator. But it isn’t long before Haxford finds itself very much in need of a detective.
Luckily, Scorbion and the local barber are old acquaintances, and the barbershop employs a cast of memorable characters who—together with an aspiring young ace reporter for the local Morning News—are nothing less than enthralled by the enigmatic new chief police inspector.
Investigating a trio of crimes whose origins span three continents and half a century, Pignon Scorbion and his “tonsorial sleuths” interview a parade of interested parties, but with every apparent clue, new surprises come to light. And just as it seems nothing can derail Scorbion’s cool head and almost unerring nose for deduction, in walks Thelma Smith—dazzling, whip-smart, and newly single.
Has Pignon Scorbion finally met his match?
For fans of Sherlock Holmes and Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot, author Rick Bleiweiss’s quirky new detective and ensemble cast of characters set against the backdrop of small-town England in the 1910s, will feel both comfortingly familiar and thrillingly new.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Rick Bleiweiss started his career in music as a rock performer, producer of over fifty records, songwriter and record company senior executive, and worked with Clive Davis, Melissa Etheridge, the Backstreet Boys, Kiss, U2, Whitney Houston, the BeeGees, and other industry legends.
Since 2006 as a publishing company executive, he has acquired works by bestselling and award-winning authors including James Clavell, Gabriel García Márquez, Rex Pickett, Leon Uris, and Nicholas Sansbury Smith, among others.
In his latest creative endeavor, Rick has crafted the Pignon Scorbion historical mystery series—blending his love of the past with the twisty deliciousness of a whodunit. Follow Rick and Scorbion at www.RickBleiweiss.com
