Death in St. Petersburg: A Lady Emily Mystery

In bestseller Alexander’s well-crafted 12th Lady Emily novel (after 2016’s A Terrible Beauty), the redoubtable Englishwoman joins her husband, intelligence agent Colin Hargreaves, on a trip to St. Petersburg in January 1900. The couple attend a performance of Swan Lake at the Mariinksky Theatre, where ballet sensation Irina Nemetseva dances the lead, though they’re puzzled when another ballerina dances the final act. Later, they discover that Irina lies stabbed to death outside the stage door, still wearing her swan costume. After Prince Vasilii Guryanov, the dancer’s secret lover, asks Emily to help find her killer, Emily probes Irina’s circle, including her oldest friend and rival: fellow ballerina Ekaterina “Katenka” Sokolova. Katenka is the sister of Irina’s former love, a young man whose idealism is dangerous in repressive Russia. Do their tangled relationships give a motive to murder the star? In addition to a satisfying puzzle and the always appealing protagonist, Alexander delivers a memorable portrait of a fairy-tale city dancing on the brink of revolution. Agent: Anne Hawkins, John Hawkins & Associates. (Oct.)