The stunning first novel in the V.I. Warshawski series, introducing one of the world's best-loved private investigators.

Meeting an anonymous client on a sizzling summer night is asking for trouble. Especially when the client lies and tells V.I. Warshawski he's the prominent banker John Thayer, looking for his son's missing girlfriend. But V.I. soon discovers the real John Thayer's son - and he's dead.

As V.I. begins to question her mysterious client's motives, she sinks deeper into Chicago's darker side: a world of gangsters, insurance fraud and contract killings. And while she must concentrate on saving the life of someone she has never met, it becomes clear that she is in danger of losing her own.

"How enjoyable to settle down with a new book by Sara Paretsky." - Sunday Telegraph

"With the creation of V.I. Warshawski, Sara Paretsky did more than anyone to change the face of contemporary women's fiction." - Express on Sunday

"Warshawski's darkest outing, with no sign that her creator is flagging. Paretsky has written a novel in which a great deal is stripped bare, including Warshawski's innermost anxieties about herself, producing a narrative as gripping as it is emotionally wrenching." - JOAN SMITH, Sunday Times