Product Description

When Assistant District Attorney Alex Cooper is summoned to Tina Barr’s apartment on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, she finds a neighbor convinced that the young woman was assaulted. But the terrified victim, a conservator of rare books and maps, refuses to cooperate with investigators. Then another woman is found murdered in that same apartment with an extremely valuable book, believed to have been stolen. As Alex pursues the murderer, she is drawn into the strange and privileged world of the Hunt family, major benefactors of the New York Public Library and passionate rare book collectors who may be willing to kill for their treasures.


Copy and paste the URL below into your browser to download a free pdf of Linda Fairstein's new novel, Hell Gate, available in hardcover March 2010:
http://knopfdoubleday.com/marketing/Hell_Gate_Chapter_1.pdf

---

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #236832 in Books
• Published on: 2009-02-10
• Released on: 2009-02-10
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 384 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780385523998
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

Amazon.com Review
Book Description
In Linda Fairstein’s outstanding new novel, the New York Public Library houses dazzling treasures—and deadly secrets.

When Assistant District Attorney Alex Cooper is summoned to Tina Barr’s apartment on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, she finds a neighbor convinced that the young woman was assaulted. But the terrified victim, a conservator of rare books and maps, refuses to cooperate with investigators. Then another woman is found murdered in that same apartment with an extremely valuable book, believed to have been stolen. As Alex pursues the murderer, she is drawn into the strange and privileged world of the Hunt family, major benefactors of the New York Public Library and passionate rare book collectors.

Eventually Alex connects their internal family rivalries to a priceless edition of Alice in Wonderland, which also contains the world’s oldest map. Would one of the well-bred Hunts be willing to kill for the treasures? The search for the answer takes Alex and her team on a breathtaking chase from Manhattan’s grandest apartments to the secret tunnels and chambers of the New York Public Library, and finally to a nineteenth-century underground vault. There, in the pitch-black darkness, Alex comes face-to-face with the killer who values money more than life.

Featuring a cast of elite, erudite, and downright eccentric characters, and a complex trail of clues that will have you guessing until the final pages, Lethal Legacy is Linda Fairstein’s most beguiling thriller yet.

Amazon Exclusive: Harlan Coben Reviews Lethal Legacy

Harlan Coben, author of the bestselling Myron Bolitar series, reviews Lethal Legacy for Amazon:

Okay, there are two kinds of people reading this review: those who have already read Linda Fairstein and her terrific series featuring sex crime unit ADA Alexandra Cooper and her sidekick, NYPD Detective Mike Chapman, a man so real to me I once had him help out one of my own fictional characters. And those of you who, uh, haven't.

For those who have, let's make this quick. Lethal Legacy is great. No worries. It is filled with what you already love about her books--the characters, the plot twists, the suspense, the heightened realism that only someone who has truly walked the walked (for those living in a cave, Linda Fairstein was the ADA who helped create the sex crimes unit in Manhattan) can provide.

On top of that, Fairstein had done some wonderful research on the New York Public Library. She weaves the lore of this legendary edifice into a nifty mystery that starts off as a harrowing missing-person-homicide case--but blossoms into something far deeper. I think I dug the parts involving the NYPL most of all.

In short, stop wasting your time reading this and dive in. You already know what to expect.

To those who haven't read Fairstein and thus haven't yet "chilled" with Cooper and Chapman, well, what's the deal? Lethal Legacy is a great place to start--my personal favorite in this New York Times bestselling series. Don't you love finding a new author with a big backlist? Me too.

So here's what you do. See that yellow box up in the right-hand corner? Click it now and see what the fuss is all about. You'll thank me later.

(Photo Credit Beatrice LeGrand)

From Publishers Weekly
At the start of bestseller Fairstein's entertaining 11th legal thriller to feature ADA Alexandra Cooper of Manhattan's Sex Crimes Prosecution Unit (after Killer Heat), Alex persuades librarian Tina Barr to go to the hospital after a burglar posing as a fireman assaults Tina at her East Side home. After Tina disappears, a woman's corpse turns up in Tina's abandoned apartment that looks like Tina's landlady, heiress Minerva Hunt, but in fact is Minerva's Romanian housekeeper. Alex and her sidekick, NYPD detective Mike Chapman, later learn that Tina was once employed by Minerva's father, Jasper Hunt, a rare book and map collector. The investigation leads Alex and her team into the dark depths of the New York Public Library in search of stolen items that certain bibliophiles and antique map enthusiasts would kill for. Full of fun information about the NYPL, the plot builds to a cool resolution that sets up Alex's next adventure involving a disturbing cold case. Author tour. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Readers need not be familiar with previous Alexandra Cooper thrillers to appreciate this one. They will, however, need a deep curiosity about book collecting, maps, and libraries—particularly the New York Public Library. Cooper (Blondie, as her detective sidekick Mike Chapman teasingly calls her) is summoned to the scene of a possible sex crime, only to find that the victim, a conservator associated with the NYPL, isn’t keen on letting anyone investigate anything. In fact, she disappears. Later she turns up dead, but not before someone else’s corpse is found, lying atop a valuable book that leads detectives right back to the NYPL. Fairstein’s novels frequently interweave the stories of New York City landmarks, including Governor’s Island and the Metropolitan Opera, but this time the history is delivered suspiciously like a lecture. That said, the facts are still fascinating, especially those concerning a legendary sixteenth-century map, around which everything ultimately turns. Curiosity piqued, readers will surely want to find out more. Fairstein is known for legal thrillers, but this book needs hand selling as a bibliothriller. --Stephanie Zvirin

---

Customer Reviews

A Thriller for Bibliophiles
Lethal Legacy is a fairly tight thriller that ought to appeal to bibliophiles. Set in present-day Manhattan, Assistant District Attorney Alex Cooper is led on an investigation that leads her directly to the New York Public Library.

The history and inner workings of the historic landmark is skillfully woven into the tale making for a fun diversion in this otherwise standard-fare thriller.

If you love rare books, their history and bits of literary trivia, you'll likely enjoy this ride. The thriller portion of the story is pretty tight and the pace clips right along to a marginally-predictable, but nontheless satisfying, ending.

Recommended!

Lethal Legacy
A man disguised as a fireman sets off an incendiary device in a hall way. As it fills the air with smoke, he knocks on the door of one the inhabitants of the building, Tina Barr, and when she lets him in, he attacks her. After he leaves, she locks herself in her apartment, refusing to let in the police and other law enforcement agencies who come to help. Alexandra(Alex) Cooper, an assistant district attorney, finally convinces her to unlock the door and seek medical help but just as soon as the paramedics take Tina to the hospital, she leaves and disappears. The police cannot officially look for her because she left of her own free will and is therefore not a missing person and she never actually reported a crime was committed. Eventually Alex's boss receives pressure from outside sources and demands that she find Tina. A few days later Tina is found, dead and wrapped in tarp in Bryant Park.

The questions surrounding Tina's death are many. Was her death related to the work she did as a restorer of rare books for the library and for private clients? Did Tina know something or see something that led to her brutal slaying? Was Tina involved in the loss of millions of dollars worth of rare books and maps that were missing from donated collections in the library? Was her death related to that of another woman found murdered in her former apartment?

This book is interesting in the way that it turns the main branch of the New York Public library into a fascinating backdrop for a thriller. Notable facts about history, book binding, legacies to institutions are topics covered in great depth. It is quite fascinating what you learn as you read the book. It gave me an interesting insight into the city I call home and its numerous cultural institutions.

Like many books, Lethal Legacy sometimes fails to capture the ways in which real human beings interact. For example. right after the body of Tina Barr is found, the head of the library is leading the detectives back to the library's interior. As they walk pass the giant sculptures of the lions in front of the building,one of the detectives makes a comment about the lions and the head of the library proceeds to give him a mini lecture on the lions. She tells him that they attained their names, Patience and Fortitude, because the then Mayor of New York felt that these were qualities that New Yorkers would need in order to survive the depression. A woman was just killed, what normal human being would be discussing stone sculptures at such a time? Another weakness of the book was it tendency to sometimes go on and on and on about historical events and incidents in a way that almost detracted from the story. Luckily the author was able to rein herself in before this became an absolute distraction. It is obvious that the author did a lot of research into the literary and artistic world of New York. This hard work pays off as we end up with a tale that keeps you interested from start to finish.

All in all, I really enjoyed this book and will definitely seek out more by Ms. Fairstein in the future.

Not her best
I was excited to see a new book by Linda Fairstein, one of my favorite writers. When I got the book and realized it was all about books and the New York Public Library, I couldn't wait to start reading. Unfortunately, I had to force myself to finish. There's very little action in the book and the mystery is thin. WAY too much telling! Fairstein is known for taking a New York location and researching it well. However, here she tries to put every bit of that research into the book and it's boring. There is very little action in this story and the love affair with her French lover, Luc, is ridiculous. I will think long and hard before reading another Fairstein book.