Visions in Death (In Death)

22# Eve Dallas Investigation In Death 'The summer had been long hot and bloody. Fall, with its cooler temperatures was coming. Maybe people wouldn't be as inclined to kill each other. But she doubted it.' In 2059 New York City, technology and humanity collide, Detective Eve Dallas searches the darkest corners of Manhattan for an elusive killer with a passion for collecting souls... On one of the city's hottest nights, New York Police Lieutenant Eve Dallas is sent to Central Park-and into a hellish new investigation. Her latest homicide case is a particularly vicious case. The victim, Elisa Maplewood, a young mother, is found on the rocks, just above the still, dark water of the lake. Raped and strangled in the park, her body naked but for what appears to be a single red ribbon tied around her neck. Her hands are posed, as if in prayer. But it is the eyes-removed with such precision, as if done with the careful hands of a surgeon-that have Dallas most alarmed. Eve starts investigating Elisa's friends and relations, and as more bodies turn up, each with the same defining scars, Eve is frantic for answers. An offer of help comes from an unlikely source. The only reason Eve agrees to meet with psychic Celina Sanchez is that she is a friend of a friend. But Celina claims to have experienced visions of the killer and can recite precise details of the case - details that the police have kept to themselves. She is also no glory-hunter - she doesn't want her name released to the media. Haunted by the visions of death that she sees, all she wants to do is help Eve catch the criminal so that she is left in peace. Though Eve remains sceptical of Celina's abilities, against her instincts, she serves the greater good, and she will use all the resources she can to track down the killer before he strikes again... The psychic who offers one vision after another-each with shockingly accurate details of the murders. And when partner and friend Peabody is badly injured after escaping an attack, the stakes are raised. Are the eyes a symbol? A twisted religious ritual? A souvenir? With help from her husband, Roarke, Dallas must uncover the killer's motivation before another vision becomes another nightmare....

Beyond its central premise, the book can be read through the connected lenses of Romance, Fiction. Those themes offer useful points of attention as the characters, ideas, or world develop, especially where the book complicates the expectations of its primary category.