Everyone's favorite criminologist, Lincoln Rhyme, is back! This time, he and his partner and paramour Amelia Sachs, face their toughest perp yet: the mysterious '522,' who commits vicious crimes and then plants ironclad evidence that implicates innocent men, including Rhyme's own cousin, Arthur. As Lincoln and Amelia try to clear Arthur's name, the tables are turned and they themselves become the hunted, testing their partnership like never before....

Renowned investigator and forensics expert, Lincoln Rhyme, is drafted to investigate the sniper-killing of a U.S. citizen in the Bahamas. While his partner, Amelia Sachs, traces the victim's steps in Manhattan, Rhyme leaves the city to pursue the sniper himself.

Recruited to help the FBI and the INS perform the nearly impossible, Lincoln Rhyme and his partner, Amelia Sachs, manage to track down a cargo ship headed for New York City carrying two dozen illegal Chinese immigrants, as well as the notorious human smuggler and killer known as "the Ghost." But when the Ghost's capture goes disastrously wrong, Lincoln and Amelia find themselves in a horrifying race against time.

In the aftermath of two brutal New York City murders, quadriplegic detective Lincoln Rhyme and his team work doggedly to prevent additional killings by a time-obsessed serial murderer.

This thriller pits forensic criminologist Lincoln Rhyme and his partner Amelia Sachs against an unstoppable "invisible" killer. As the fatalities rise and the minutes tick down, they must move beyond the smoke and mirrors to prevent a terrifying act of vengeance that could become the greatest vanishing act of all.

"Amelia Sachs is hot on the trail of a killer. She's chasing him through a department store in Brooklyn when an escalator malfunctions. The stairs give way, with one man horribly mangled by the gears. Sachs is forced to let her quarry escape as she jumps in to try to help save the victim. She and famed forensic detective Lincoln Rhyme soon learn, however, that the incident may not be an accident at all, but the first in a series of intentional attacks....