In the stately nineteenth-century homes on Philadelphia's Delancey Street, the wilder passions scarcely ruffle the peace. Murder is unimaginable, particularly a murder involving an upscale book discussion group, of which schoolteacher Amanda Pepper is a devoted member." "Nevertheless, on the day after a heated discussion of a fictional heroine's suicide, book group member Helen Coulter falls to her death from her roof garden. Helen's death is declared a suicide - a shocking end to a perfect life - but Amanda is skeptical. In the course of recording the group's memories of Helen, inconsistencies and questions arise - and Amanda becomes convinced that Helen Coulter did not take her own life." "Amanda's investigations will draw her into a zone of great danger, where Helen Coulter's ice-hearted killer is once more ready to strike.