Guernica Editions

The basic damsel-in-distress gig sounds perfect to private investigator Ashley Smeeton, who's got her own personal and professional struggles in Montreal. Against the backdrop of the winter Carnaval, the job first takes her to Paris where she's drawn into an unsettling world of mirages and masks, not to mention the murderous Bortnik brothers. When she returns to Montreal, a city rife with its own unreasonable facsimiles, the case incomprehensibly picks up again. Convinced she's being played, Ashley embarks on an even more dangerous journey into duplicity. In a world of masks behind masks, it's hard to say where the truth lies.

The woman who stood in the open doorway, against a receding vista of luxurious rooms, took Ashley's breath away. Mirabel Saint Cyr was a fair blonde with blue-grey eyes. She had a well-proportioned figure, seemed tall but wasn't really. It was how the various elements were assembled that made the difference. Her naturally ash blonde hair was in a thick chopped wavy style, like a grown-out fifties Italian boy cut. It suited the shape of her head perfectly, and framed features whose purity verged on the angelic. These included a pair of remarkable eyes that changed colour and moved like restless water under the impulse of thoughts and emotions. When she took in the presence of Ashley, the effect was of light striking sombre water, sideways. On top of everything else, the woman looked far younger than thirty.