Ed McBain

An old woman and her cat are shot in an apartment in New York. As officers Steve Carella and Cotton Hawes investigate, they learn the victim was a famous Russian pianist who in her youth gave concerts on both sides of the Atlantic. The killing of the cat tells them it was not a burglary.

It's not a mystery, it's a story of survival and triumph. That's what some people say about Romance, a would-be hit play about an actress pursued by a knife-wielding stalker. But isn't it romantic! Before the show can open, the leading lady is really attacked, outside the theater. And before the detectives of the 87th can solve that crime, the same actress is stabbed again. This time for keeps. A.D.A. Nellie Brand moves in for a murder conviction,...

Detectives Steve Carella and Fat Ollie Weeks follow a trail of counterfeit money to an old family publishing firm.

Uptown Manhattan is where Olivia Kidd forces her brother Sarge to sell his beloved collection of paintings as ordered by their father, a Texas trillionaire. Downtown, Detective Reardon seeks for clues to the gunmen who have shot Ralph D'Annunzio dead in his restaurant. Robbery isn't the motive; there seems to be none, nor can Reardon make a connection between D'Annunzio and a second murder victim, a lawyer killed after leaving a stock broker's office....

The hanging death of a nondescript old man in a shabby apartment in the 87th Precinct leads detectives Carella, Meyer, Brown, and Weeks to the discovery of an upcoming musical with ties to a mysterious drug, and a killer.