The hugely successful young author Xaver Pucher still had a lot to live for. But on the way to meet his agent and hand over his new manuscript, he is murdered in the sleeper car on board the train from Vienna to Berlin. The police find no sign of the manuscript in his luggage, just traces of cocaine. Was Pucher's murder connected to drugs? Or have the Islamist group, for whom his books went too far, acted on their threats? Vienna and Berlin investigate the case together: on the Austrian side Anna Habel, in her late thirties, temperamental and untiring, and on the German side Thomas Bernhardt, in his mid fifties, sarcastic and with an air of melancholy. With their differing temperaments it is not long before they clash, but for the sake of the case and under pressure from the public they have to find a way to work together. Their investigations lead them to Vienna's central graveyard, to the Prater Park and the alleys of the historic city and to the hip offices of Berlin's Prenzlauer Berg, the courtyards of Schöneberg and the bars of Neukölln.

Neither of them can function without the other – the investigator duo that is Thomas Bernhardt and Anna Habel returns for another round. Already a star of the Austrian National Theatre, actress Sophie Lechner had her sights set on bringing down the house in Berlin, but her last, dramatic act comes far too soon. The young woman is stabbed in her apartment by Berlin's Lietzensee, loud opera music resonating out from her apartment even hours after her murder. Whether they want to or not, Berlin detective inspector Thomas Bernhardt and Viennese chief inspector Anna Habel have no choice but to join forces once more. Did one of Sophie's numerous lovers commit a crime of passion, or had the eccentric actress made enemies in the thespian world? When other people who knew Sophie turn up dead, the two investigators find themselves hot under the collar despite the arctic temperatures in their snow-deluged cities.

One meets interesting characters in the art trade: obsessive collectors and greedy agents, cocky patrons and vain curators, audacious forgers and simple thieves. When a Viennese art appraiser and a Berlin collector are murdered almost simultaneously, Inspector Anna Habel and Commissioner Thomas Bernhardt have to find out what lies beneath the surface of this colourful world. In this industry, no one knows what’s genuine and what’s false. Whether it’s a matter of paintings or feelings: you can trust no one. And yet spring has sprung – the sun is shining, and the world is revealing itself to be so alluring that it proves hard for Anna Habel and Thomas Bernhardt to keep their wits about them.