There's trouble in Sharon McCone's quiet San Francisco apartment building. Madame Anya, with her cards, her tamed crow, and her candles, had predicted evil for Molly Antonio. Linnea Carraway, drinking heavily and careening in the wake of a divorce, had argued with her. Now the sweet, elderly lady lies dead in her apartment. Linnea, last to see Molly alive, is the prime suspect, and if Sharon means to clear her best friend, she has to find the murderer fast. Sleuthing out the small-time secrets of her quirky neighbors leads Sharon in and around the neighborhood, and, much to her surprise, to a shocking string of big-time deals and blackmail. Suddenly death is in the cards, threatening Sharon's oldest friendship, her professional credibility-and her life. Marcia Muller's Ask the Cards brings back Sharon McCone, the New York private eye. Now she is confronted with the murder of a neighbor in her apartment house... Sharon sets out to solve the case. It's all neighborhood stuff-the corner grocer, a blind man, a fortuneteller, the middle class of the city-written in a snappy prose and nicely worked out.