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"Ed McBain is, by far, the best at what he does. Case closed." --People Magazine

Once she had filled the concert halls of Europe with beautiful music. Once her name had been in headlines, her performances heralded in newspapers around the world. Now she lay dead on the cold floor of an apartment on the coldest night of the year, a little old woman with a shattered bottle of cheap liquor by her body and two fatal gunshot wounds to her chest. Svetlana Dyalovich, found dead at midnight, was one more homicide in one more endless night in the city.

For detectives Carella and Hawes, no murder is ever routine, and while this one looks at first like a robbery, the evidence doesn't add up. And when they interview Svetlana's hard-edged, lounge-singing granddaughter -- a woman accompanied by two armed bodyguards -- they start looking for a missing envelope full of money and a killer who had more than robbery on his mind.

Like a concert grand under the hands of a virtuoso, Nocturne sounds a multitude of moods and notes in a discordant melody -- where only some of the victims are innocent, and only some of the victimizers are criminals, and the final chord will resound long after the tale is told.

Ed McBain, author of the 87th Precinct and Matthew Hope mystery novels, is one of America's most prodigious and popular novelists. He is also a successful writer for television and cinema, whose credits include the screenplay for Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds. Writing under his real name, Evan Hunter, Mr. McBain has published dozens of books, including the classic bestsellers The Blackbird Jungle, Strangers When We Meet and Criminal Conversation.

Written and performed by Ed McBain - Abridged Fiction - 2 CASSETTES

Publisher, Audio Renaissance (May 1997)