It's Oscar night in Hollywood, and after years of climbing the entertainment ladder, media darling Meredith Johansen has finally taken home a gold statue.

Across town, rookie Detective Patricia Norelli is working late with hopes of breaking through her own glass ceiling with a promotion in the LAPD. Their paths unexpectedly collide when Johansen is discovered dead in her Bel Air home, only hours after Oscar night festivities ended.

With a note and even fewer clues, authorities rule it a suicide. Norelli's instinct says murder—a hunch worth risking a pending promotion to prove otherwise.

When a long list of suspects emerges, she and partner Detective Stuart Brown find themselves entangled in a chaotic series of lies. Trying to find the real killer amidst a web of deception, Norelli & Brown lose ground when a key suspect turns up dead. Then in the middle of reworking hunches, Brown has to take paternity leave.

Before he can return, Norelli gets too close to the truth and lands in the trap of a pathological serial killer.

If you like Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch and John Sanford's Lucas Davenport, you'll enjoy David Temple's Pat Norelli.