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Published in USA
Mar 2011
400 pages
Genre: Thrillers
Publication Information
It's the middle of the night. Prosecutor Alexandra Cooper is called to Harlem's Mount Neboh Baptist Church, a beautiful house of worship originally built as a synagogue. But the crowd gathered there isn't interested in architecture, or even prayer. They've come for the same reason Alex has: to find out why the body of a young woman has been decapitated, set on fire, and left burning on the church steps.
The only identifiable artifact on the charred remains is the imprint of a Star of David necklace seared into the victim's flesh. Alex wonders if the fire was meant to destroy this woman's body, or to draw attention to it. Her fears are confirmed days later, when a second corpse is found at a cathedral in Little Italy. The killings look like serial hate crimes, but the apparent differences in the victims' beliefs seem to eliminate a religious motive. Convinced that another young woman is bound to die, Alex mines the depths of Manhattan's many houses of worship to find a connection between the victims - and in the process uncovers a terrible and perilous truth that takes her far beyond the scope of her investigation, and directly into the path of terrible danger.
"If the unraveling of her thirteenth thriller is a tad over the top, Fairstein makes up for it with her usual bite of Big Apple history [and] the bantering, caring, respectful repartee..." - Booklist
"Fairstein excels at describing New York's complicated religious history as well as the vagaries of the city's legal and religious politics." - Publishers Weekly
"The 13th entry in Fairstein's series is a tightly wound mystery that delivers an adrenaline rush with its fast-paced, nail-biting manhunt across several states." - Library Journal
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Author photograph by Sigrid Estrada
Linda Fairstein, America's foremost legal expert on crimes of sexual assault and domestic violence, led the Sex Crimes Unit of the District Attorney's Office in Manhattan for twenty-five years. A Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, she is a graduate of Vassar College and the University of Virginia School of Law. Her first novel, Final Jeopardy, introduced the critically acclaimed character of Alexandra Cooper and was made into an ABC Movie of the Week starring Dana Delaney. The celebrated series has gone on to include the New York Times bestsellers Likely to Die, Cold Hit, The Deadhouse (winner of the Nero Wolfe Award for Best Crime Novel of 2001, and chosen as a "Best Book of 2001" by both The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times), The Bone ...
... Full Biography
Author Interview
Link to Linda Fairstein's Website
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