In modern-day London, a descendant of the legendary founder of Communism is murdered, and two Scotland Yard sleuths are on the case.

A notorious curmudgeon, Detective Chief Inspector David Brock has his doubts about Detective Sergeant Kathy Kolla, a young neophyte to the legendary Scotland Yard, especially since her first case could have such daunting implications. Meredith Winterbottom, a great-granddaughter of Karl Marx and a longtime resident of Jerusalem Lane—a Dickensian section of London inhabited by Eastern European immigrants—is found dead in her apartment. Along with her two sisters and other Lane residents, she'd been seeing red over plans to gentrify their neighborhood.

The unofficial suspect, for now, is some money-hungry developer. But when a second Marx sister is murdered, Brock and Kolla fear that something even more sinister is unfolding. As they delve into the Lane's eccentric melting pot, they discover revealing and previously unseen letters from Marx, a possible fourth volume of Das Kapital, a long list of suspects ranging from Meredith's shady son to a Princeton professor to a Polish veteran of World War II—and a devious plot to make certain Kathy Kolla's first case is her last.

"Intelligently devised and subtly plotted" (Dallas Morning News), this first book in the popular series was shortlisted for a Crime Writers Association award for Best First Mystery, and was hailed by the Providence Sunday Journal as a "beautifully crafted...stunning debut."