The bottom line is that somebody doesn’t want this Rangoon-Wolfman-Pinkus collaboration to hit the stage. Frivolous lawsuits are draining the budget and Alfie Rangoon is ready to try anything to raise more money. He calls in his old friend and fellow ACTRA-member, Alias Hunter Knox, to play a part at party for investors: a big-money oil man from Alberta willing to invest big. At the rehearsal of the Tell-Tale Heart, the stakes go up when a real dead man is found beneath the stage floor. Then another body is found, a kidnapping happens, an explosion, an attempted murder and so on and so on.

There are a lot of jokes that will be found in all Alias Hunter Knox novels. For example, nobody can remember Hunter 10 minutes after they meet him unless specific measures are taken. We never find out his real name. There is always somebody in the players named Wdnyzkoscdckyzny. If Poe: The Musical wasn’t so silly it would be gruesome; and I mean silly in a good way, not the wasteful way. I was so proud of myself! I figured out whodunit, except that I got it wrong (it fits with the storyline to be obtuse).

The thing I appreciated most (besides giggling on almost every page) was the scholarship involved in the creation of the play choreographing Poe’s tragic life through his writing and the stage production.

If you can only read one really funny book this year, make sure it is Poe: the Musical.