Hedshot

By: David W. Barber

Narrated by: Matthew Spaur

In a small town with secrets, a jaded journalist uncovers a scandal some powerful forces would kill to keep hidden.

When corporate “restructuring” takes veteran journalist Dugan Heywood’s newspaper job, he takes a temp gig as a church musician as a welcome change of pace from his old beat of crime and corruption.

But when a former lover’s sudden death makes him suspect murder even when the police don’t, Dugan must rely on his old investigative skills to find answers on his own. His digging soon upsets someof the rich and powerful in his staid old university town. Does a scandal that once tore the town apart also lie at the heart of this new mystery? And are those powerful forces willing to commit murder to keep their dark secrets from surfacing again?

–––––––––

David W. Barber is a longtime newspaper journalist and musician and the internationally bestselling author of Bach, Beethoven and the Boys and more than a dozen other books of humorous classical music history and literature as well as the short story fiction collection Atonement and other stories. Hedshot is his first full-length mystery novel. In a varied career, among his more interesting jobs have been short stints as a roadie for Pope John Paul II, a publicist for Prince Rainier of Monaco and a backup singer for Avril Lavigne.

©2023 David W. Barber (P)2025 David W. Barber

Critic reviews

“Like his hero, David Barber loves a good mystery, and here he’s written one. A slow burn of red herrings, plot twists and surprises that will keep you guessing until the end.”– Wilson Coneybeare, writer-director of the Netflix film American Hangman and author of the dystopian political thriller A Feast of Wolves