S1E8 This Little Piggy Went to the Bank

Welcome to Mysteries to Die For.I am TG Wolff and am here with Jack, my piano player and producer. This is a podcast where we combine storytelling with original music to put you at the heart of mystery, murder, and mayhem. Some episodes will be my own stories, others will be classics that helped shape the mystery genre we know today. These are arrangements, which means instead of word-for-word readings, you get a performance meant to be heard. Jack and I perform these live, front to back, no breaks, no fakes, no retakes (unless it's really bad)This is Season 1. The first half of the season comes from my book Widow’s Run, which was published in 2019 by Down & Out Books. If you love clever, sharp-edged mysteries and thrillers, check out Down & Out on the web. www.downandoutbooks.comToday’s episode builds from the previous. Really, you have to listen in order for the story to make sense. Start with the episode called “What a Lovely Corpse you Have” and catch up to us from there. We’ll be here for you. We’ve listed a cast of characters in the show notes to help keep track of the players.To recap, our hero, Diamond, has faked her death, burying the mainstream, suburban professional she was to resurrect her CIA cover. Why? She needs to do what the police won’t, investigate her husband’s death. In the last episode, Diamond and her Italian guide Carlo Giancarlo find the man who hit and killed Gavriil. Hugo Franzetti was a thief, a black mailer, and as dead nearly as long as Gavriil. We pick up this week as Diamond and Carlo follow the money.Today’s story is about bad timing, thinking laterally, and writing your own story. This is Episode 8: This Little Piggy Went to the Bank.*******Characters with episode of introductionDiamond, our hero. Recently widowed. Recently (fake) killed herself. On a mission. (E1)Gavriil Rubchinsky. Russian-born, nerd scientist specializing in quinoa. Diamond’s husband. Died May 14, 2018. The reason for Diamond. (E1)Ian Black. Average, ordinary, white man. Extraordinary purveyor of anything, anywhere, anytime. (E1)Sam Irish. British agent. Formerly worked with Diamond. Pissed she died without him. (E1)Andrew Dixon. Seventeen-year-old genius delinquent currently surfing Diamond’s couch (E4) Enrique Torres. CIA agent who trained and worked with Diamond. Can’t believe a candle took her out. (E1)Alexei Rubchinsky. Russian-born, nerd scientist specializing in the body. Diamond’s brother-in-law. (E2)Dr. Quili Liu. Gavriil Rubchinsky’s successor, a Chinese-born, nerd-scientist who also loves quinoa. (E2)Buford Winston. Blow hard leader of the super-lobby Ag Now! who is funding the quinoa research. (E2)Montgomery Rand. Minor league con man. Reported genius who doesn’t have the brains to use what God gave him. (E3)Carlo Giancarlo. Diamond’s Italian translator and partner in crime. (E5)Francisco Thelan. Another nerd-scientist specializing in food. Also dead. Died same night as Gavriil. (E5)Ilsa Duma-whatever. Russian-born Italian bookseller. Totally did not seduce Gavriil. (E6)Mama Franzetti. A good woman with a piece of shit for a grandson. (E7)Hugo Franzetti. The piece of shit that ran Gavriil over, but he’s dead, too, so there’s that. (E7)Valentina Rossifiori. A single mother and friend of Hugo Franzetti who is keeping him “alive” to stop all the judging. (E8)*******Mysteries to Die For is sponsored by Down & Out Books. The featured new release this week is OCCAM’S RAZOR by Joe Clifford. Former top-flight prospect Oz Reyes heads security for Coastal Sports Network in Los Angeles. On the eve of the annual awards show, his boss Delma Dupree summons him to Miami. At her waterfront mansion, Oz encounters a chaotic scene with police and emergency vehicles. Delma’s oldest son, Jackson, explains his mother has recently been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, and was picked up by police wandering during the night. At first Delma seems fine to Oz, but when she asks him to look into her adopted son’s seemingly airtight conviction, her symptoms begin to show. Despite Oz’s polite refusal, Delma insists he store a file, which she swears contains the truth of who really committed the crime. Once Oz comes in possession of that file, an open and shut case suddenly seems less so, as forces seen and unseen conspire to take him down. He dives headlong into South Florida’s glitzy and glamorous underbelly, uncovering a Miami crawling with shifty detectives, rogue assassins, and hard-drinking, sexual deviants. A world where no one and nothing is what it seems.OCCAM’S RAZOR by Joe Clifford is now available through Down & Out’s website, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, indiebound, and all your favorite independent booksellers. https://downandoutbooks.com/bookstore/clifford-occams-razor/******That’s it for this episode of Mysteries To Die For. In two weeks, we’ll pick up the story with the next chapter Welcome to the Dark Side, We Have Cookies.If you enjoyed our twist on storytelling, help spread the word by telling a friend or leaving a review. For less than the cost of a fancy Italian soda, you can join our body bag brigade to help support our show. You’ll receive bonus content as our thanks. https://www.patreon.com/mysteriestodiefor?fan_landing=trueMysteries to Die For was written by TG Wolff. Music and production are by Jack Wolff. Episode art is by Shannon Leahy. Widow’s Run was written by TG Wolff, published by Down & Out Books. www.tgwolff.comwww.Facebook.com/tina.wolff.125@tg_wolff