In the rarefied world of New York's Metropolitan Opera, talented young violinist Julia Kogan is about to launch into her debut performance when the unthinkable happens: her mentor, world-famous opera conductor Abel Trudeau, is felled from the podium by an assassin's bullet. Despite her grief, she must pull herself together to find the real killer when Sidney Richter, her closest colleague in the orchestra, is unjustly accused of Abel's murder. Teaming up with NYPD detective Larry Somers, Julia probes the back stairways and hidden corners of the opera house, only to find that a bee's nest of intrigue and peril lies beneath the glittering exterior of the venerable institution. Danger awaits Julia onstage, in the wings, and in the pit, as scenery crashes down beside her and threatening notes are left on her music. In the end, only her quick wits and her instinct for survival can save her.
A decade or so ago, Erica Miner was a violinist with the Metropolitan Opera Company in New York City. When injuries from a car accident forced her to give up her professional musical career, she knew she needed another creative outlet and turned to her lifelong love of writing to fill the gap, studying screenwriting and novel writing in New York and Los Angeles. Her first screenplay, Hummingbird, won an award in the Writers Digest competition, and other scripts have been winners in the Santa Fe and WinFemme competitions. Erica's debut novel, Travels With My Lovers, won the Fiction Prize in the Direct from the Author Book Awards. In 2009, she published FourEver Friends, a coming-of-age novel set in the 1960s. Her suspense thriller, Murder In The Pit, based on her experiences at the Met Opera, was published in June of 2010, and has garnered five-star reviews across the board. Erica has written screenplays for all three of her published novels.
Erica's writings have appeared in Vision Magazine, WORD San Diego, Our City - Istanbul, and numerous E-zines, and she is currently writing opera articles and reviews for the well known website OperaPulse.com. Erica has appeared in dozens of interviews on radio and online. She lectures widely on writing and opera and is a top-rated lecturer for Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines.

