Description

"[An] elegant historical mystery . . . stylishly presented and intelligently resolved" set at the dawn of psychoanalysis (The New York Times Book Review).

In Vienna at the turn of the twentieth century, Max Liebermann, a contemporary of Sigmund Freud's, is at the forefront of psychoanalysis, practicing the controversial new science with all the skill of a master detective. Every dream, inflection, or slip of tongue in his "hysterical" patients has meaning and reveals some hidden truth. When beautiful medium Charlotte Löouml;wenstein dies under extraordinary circumstances, Max's good friend, Detective Oskar Rheinhardt, calls for his expert assistance. Her body has been found in a room that can only be locked from the inside. She's been shot through the heart, but there's no gun and absolutely no trace of a bullet. All signs point to a supernatural killer, but Liebermann the scientist is not so easily convinced. Especially when one of Charlotte's clients is also found in a locked room-this time bludgeoned to death.

Unfolding in the Vienna of Klimt and Mahler, a time of unprecedented activity in the worlds of philosophy, science, and art, A Death in Vienna is "an engrossing portrait of a legendary period as well as a brain teaser of startling perplexity" (Chicago Tribune).