A junkie lies dead in an Edinburgh squat spreadeagled cross-like on the floor between two burned-down candles a five-pointed star daubed on the wall above. Just another dead addict
- until John Rebus begins to chip away at the indifference treachery deceit & sleaze that lurks behind the facade of the Edinburgh familiar to tourists. Only Rebus seems to care about a death which looks more like a murder every day about a seductive danger he can almost taste appealing to the darkest corners of his mind...