'My favourite American crime-writer' New York Herald Tribune

The Glendale P.D. have their hands full again. What with an epidemic of motel hold-ups, a rapist with a fixation on hospital nurses, a teenager's suicide, an art gallery theft and a killing that leads to a zoo, there is no time for respite for Vic Varallo and co.

Delia Riordan is troubled by a very unusual mystery indeed, that of an old lady who dies suddenly of a most unexpected heart attack. Or does she? Riordan makes this her own special case, pursuing it beyond the call of duty and coming up with a most surprising answer.