Political opera has been alive and well in Washington D.C. since the city became the nation's capital, and the Washington National Opera company, housed at the Kennedy Center, is no stranger to politics itself.

Murder at the Opera re-introduces a popular couple who have appeared in some of the earlier Capital Crimes novels: law professor Mac Smith and his wife, Georgetown gallery owner Annabel Reed-Smith, who has a professional relationship with some of the Washington National Opera's most renowned players - its trustees.

The book opens with a bloody discovery: the corpse of a young soprano who has been skewered with a prop from the WNO's soon-to-premiere production of Puccini's Tosca. As the media swarm, the company sets up its own task force, and Annabel asks Mac to be involved. Life imitates opera, and suddenly all the performers seem to have something to hide: passions for one another, histories better left uncovered, and even connections to foreign terrorists. The murder investigation is in a race against time mere weeks before opening night, a black-tie gala at which everyone - including the President himself - will be in the seats.