GLADYSS OF THE HUNT

A rookie cop and a rough-edged veteran pair up to stop a series of grisly murders in Manhattan.

Gladyss Chronou is six months out of the police academy when she first meets DS Bernie Farrell at a homicide scene—the third recent murder of a long-legged blonde prostitute in a sleazy Times Square hotel. Gladyss is guarding the crime scene and the body, dismembered and decapitated, with the limbs taped together and the head placed on the victim’s abdomen. Bernie, who was one of the first responders at ground zero, has a decaying foot, a permanent cough, an irascible nature and a lack of patience with beginners. But when he asks for Gladyss to be assigned to Homicide to help him with the case, she’s pleased with the temporary promotion, until she realizes he’s chosen her not for her skills but for her looks. As a tall blonde, she’s suitable bait for the killer. Although fellow rookie Eddie O’Ryan, with whom she had a not-quite affair, frets about her safety, Gladyss wants to conduct her own investigation of one of the suspects: movie star Noel Holden. While she’s at a swanky party with him, she sees images on a website of another prostitute's murder. As she and Bernie investigate previous sex offenders who might be good for the killing spree, one clue piques Gladyss: a postcard of a statue of Diana, goddess of the hunt, who’s already appeared to Gladyss in a yoga-inspired vision. But a sting doesn’t go down as planned, the bodies continue to pile up, and Gladyss must stick her neck out again in hopes of solving the case despite the danger.

Nersesian (Mesopotamia, 2010, etc.) revisits New York in a tale combining grit and glamour, poignancy and cynical wit.