Death Is the Cool Night and Lost to the World

This volume collects two well-crafted novels by Sternberg (Sloane Hall). In Death Is the Cool Night, which is set in 1941, troubled concert pianist Gregory Silensky is one of several suspects following the murder of Ivan Roustakoff, a pompous and cruel opera conductor, at his home in Baltimore, Md. Gregory, his brain addled by heavy alcohol consumption, fears that he might have strangled his nemesis. Other suspects include Gregory’s love interest, Laura, a beautiful, aristocratic opera singer, who had her own reasons to hate Ivan. Lost to the World, set in 1954 and likewise in Baltimore, centers on the murder of a researcher pioneering a polio vaccine. Blending operatic drama, sumptuous description, and noir, Sternberg gracefully puzzles out her tormented characters’ actions and motivations in each book. The author is an Edgar Award nominee. [em](BookLife) [/em]