Addictive Books

The murder of three detectives in quick succession in the 87th Precinct leads Detective Steve Carella on a grim search that takes him into the city's underworld - from a notorious brothel to the lair of a beautiful, dangerous widow and ultimately to a .45 automatic aimed straight at his head.

He preys on women, waiting in the darkness and snatches their purses. He tells them not to scream and as they’re on the ground, reeling with pain and fear, he bows and nonchalantly says, “Clifford thanks you, madam.” But when he puts one victim in the hospital and the next in the morgue, the detectives of the 87th Precinct are not amused.

Annie Boone is dead. She was shot four times in the chest, pieces of the liquor store’s windows spread over her body like raindrops from a lethal storm. For 87th Precinct Detectives Carella, Kling, and newcomer Hawes, even more troubling is the loss of one of their own. Detective Roger Havilland is murdered shortly thereafter, a shard of glass through his jugular.