Prize-winning New York Times theater critic Alexis Soloski takes her expertise and familiarity with the stage to new lengths in her debut, HERE IN THE DARK. A woman who is faced with becoming either a murder suspect or a victim turns private investigator instead.

A former actress who gave up the stage after the tragic loss of her mother, Vivian Parry has never really left the theater. She just started writing about it instead of being written about. Now one of the most notorious critics in New York City, Vivian has settled into a bit of a reckless routine: she attends matinees and evening shows, writes her pieces on strict deadlines, and occupies the rest of her time with pills and booze. But although she reads as glamorous and flashy on paper, Vivian has used her role as a critic to blend into the background and disappear from everything but her work and her best friend, Justine. She has no family, no hobbies and no reason to ever go outside in the sun, and she likes it that way.

"Combining a prickly, unreliable narrator with a riveting mystery and wrapping it all in a tone and atmosphere that read like classic noir, HERE IN THE DARK is a devilishly clever, captivating, fresh take on the noir genre."

Recently, however, Vivian has been encouraged by her boss to work on her personal relationships with the theater community as a senior role has opened up. She has the writing chops and notoriety to take the position, but not the charm or support of her peers. So when a young academic, David Adler, calls her looking to interview her as part of his thesis on critics, she is almost swayed. And when he tells her that he’s also putting together a panel at the esteemed Performance Presenters conference and that excerpts of his work will be published in American Stage, she is hooked.

After picking a nondescript café for their meeting, Vivian prepares to deliver the same canned answers and timed laughs that make her story interesting. But when David has run through the usual questions --- What made you want to be a critic? Who’s your favorite playwright? --- he begins to ask far more personal ones. For the first time, the reader has reason to doubt Vivian. She had a much more involved past with the theater, and Vivian isn't even her real name. Shell-shocked by the potential for this interview to bring up her traumatic past, Vivian quickly puts an end to their talk…but not before David reveals that he, too, has been playing a role. Whereas the David interviewing Vivian has been nervous, sweet and cloying, the real David, whom Vivian sees only in a flash, is as sharp as a dagger point.

That should be the end of Vivian’s involvement with David, but only two weeks later, she receives a call from a crying woman named Irina. David, Irina explains, is her fiance, and he has been missing for two weeks. Vivian was the last person to see him. She promises to help and half-means it, so accustomed is she to sticking to the dark, the background, the places where no one and nothing can touch her. But she's curious, and what she soon learns about David entices her even more. It is true that he was engaged to Irina, but she failed to mention that he also was employed by her father, a tough man who recently fired him from a programming gig at his gambling website. David was suspected to have been skimming from his powerful, dangerous boss, and there seems to be good reason for him to disappear.

As Vivian learns more about David, she starts to realize that investigating what happened to him could be the pinnacle of everything she is good at: employing a keen, critical eye to find the fault lines in even the best-produced play...and, of course, acting. But someone is on to Vivian, and with a police detective hounding her, ominous notes taped to her door and mysterious clues coming from unexpected sources, Vivian will have to not only play at being a detective, but actually become one.

Combining a prickly, unreliable narrator with a riveting mystery, and wrapping it all in a tone and atmosphere that reads like classic noir, HERE IN THE DARK is a devilishly clever, captivating, fresh take on the noir genre. But where classic noir is smoke and dark alleys, this book also can be flashy, laugh-out-loud funny and seriously chilling. Soloski clearly draws upon her journalistic experience to explain the role of a critic, but her prose demands that you pay attention to every change of scenery, quick-witted dialogue, and the crumbling of our pill-popping, vodka-drinking protagonist. Love her or hate her, Vivian is a character who demands to be noticed (even if she’d swear otherwise).

While Soloski has infused her creation with a sharp wit and thoughtful approach to investigating, she’s still an every-girl, as relatable as your college roommate or most outspoken coworker. Her outlandishness is matched perfectly by Soloski, who, rather than penning a cozy, tightly wrapped mystery, takes serious risks that more than pay off, especially in the book’s explosive ending. HERE IN THE DARK would make a tremendous film or miniseries, but before that, I’m hoping for a sequel or two.