The ultra-elegant fund-raiser in a fabled Main Line mansion benefits Philly Prep's Library, and gives Amanda a chance to play Cinderella for a night. The first clue that all might not go well is the host's figure hanging in effigy outside the estate, put there by the Moral Ecologists who have a long list of classic books that "pollute the mind." When murder follows, Amanda becomes enmeshed in old secrets and young lives.

Gillian Roberts is the nom de mystère of mainstream novelist Judith Greber. Winner of the Anthony Award for Best First Mystery for Caught Dead in Philadelphia, she is also the author of Philly Stakes, I'd Rather Be in Philadelphia, With Friends Like These . . . , How I Spent My Summer Vacation, In the Dead of Summer, The Mummers' Curse, The Bluest Blood, Adam and Evil, and Helen Hath No Fury. Formerly an English teacher in Philadelphia, Gillian Roberts now lives in California.