"One of the most entertaining mysteries of the year. It's also one of
the most stimulating, as it ponders such questions as: Which is of
greater interest to the reader, the crime or the detective? And: Is the
pencil truly mightier than the butcher knife?" -- Wall Street
Journal
New York Times bestselling author of Magpie Murders and
Moriarty, Anthony Horowitz has yet again brilliantly reinvented the
classic crime novel, this time writing a fictional version of himself as
the Watson to a modern-day Holmes.
A woman crosses a London street. It is just after 11 a.m. on a bright
spring morning, and she is going into a funeral parlor to plan her own
service. Six hours later the woman is dead, strangled with a crimson
curtain cord in her own home.
Enter disgraced police detective Daniel Hawthorne, a brilliant,
eccentric man as quick with an insult as he is to crack a case. And
Hawthorne has a partner, the celebrated novelist Anthony Horowitz,
curious about the case and looking for new material. As brusque,
impatient, and annoying as Hawthorne can be, Horowitz--a seasoned hand
when it comes to crime stories--suspects the detective may be on to
something, and is irresistibly drawn into the mystery.
But as the case unfolds, Horowitz realizes that he's at the center of a
story he can't control, and his brilliant partner may be hiding dark and
mysterious secrets of his own.
