Debut Production. Volume 2

An astonishing story about how, in the distant Soviet years, a famous singer—the favorite of Brezhnev—was murdered, and what the investigators had to do to keep their positions.

1966. As a stand-in, the killer chose the black, glossy-lacquered lid of a grand piano. On it, thirteen small dishes were arranged—and burning candles were placed on them. The killer carefully examined the couch where the corpse lay, removed the emptied boxes of sleeping pills from the side table, and left only one final touch—the cherry on top. The murderer neatly placed on the singer’s chest a photograph of a woman and a strip of paper with a short sentence written in printed letters.

Half a century later, a young journalist, Petr Kravchenko, became fascinated with this case. Legendary Anastasia Kamenskaya, an investigator in retirement, helps him make contact with the people connected to those long-ago events—people who can reveal the dark secrets of the past…