New York Times bestselling author Linda Fairstein takes readers
behind the scenes of New York City's theater world -- from Lincoln
Center to the lights of Broadway -- in a riveting novel, rich with her
trademark blend of cutting-edge legal issues, skillful detective work,
and heart-stopping suspense.
Teaming up with longtime friends -- NYPD's Mike Chapman and Mercer
Wallace -- Assistant DA Alex Cooper investigates the disappearance of
world-famous dancer Natalya Galinova, who has suddenly vanished
backstage at Lincoln Center's Metropolitan Opera House -- during a
performance.
The three colleagues are soon drawn into the machinations of New York
City's secretive theatrical community, where ambition takes many forms,
including those most deadly. Among Galinova's lovers is Joe Berk, the
colorful, strong-willed boss of the Berk Organization, one of four
family companies that own all the legitimate theaters on Broadway. The
aging ballerina was using Berk to help revive her career at the time of
her disappearance.
Cooper, Chapman, and Wallace go underground and backstage at the Met,
explore Berk's unusual apartment on top of the Belasco Theatre with its
rumored ghostly resident, and then discover bizarre circumstances at
City Center, which has a peculiar history not one of them knew about
until now.
Within the glamorous but sordid inner sanctums of the Broadway elite,
the team confronts the ruthless power brokers who control both the stars
and the stages where they appear. They meet Joe's niece Mona Berk, who
is mounting a vicious campaign to extract her share of the family
fortune, and stunning starlet Lucy DeVore, whose beauty may be her fatal
undoing. Chet Dobbis is the artistic director of the Metropolitan Opera,
and therefore privy to the most scandalous exploits among its famous
inhabitants. He also knows every inch of the labyrinthine building into
which the ballerina disappeared...
Meanwhile, Alex is working on a very different case, using a creative
technique to nab a physician who has been drugging women in order to
assault them. As Dr. Selim Sengor eludes capture, Alex must navigate the
new investigative world of DFSA -- drug-facilitated sexual assault --
intent on proving him guilty.
Complicating her quest is the explosive legal and ethical dilemma of
using the existing DNA databank to solve new cases. Can Alex convince a
judge to let her prosecute a man for a violent crime using DNA that was
collected for a prior case in which he was never charged? Or do the
suspect's civil rights prevent law enforcement from keeping his DNA on
file to be used against him at any future time?
Death Dance is a spellbinding thriller combining a former prosecutor's
fresh insight into hot-button legal issues with the unique history and
spectacle of New York theater, and its shocking twists make this novel
Linda Fairstein's most chilling adventure yet.
