The Icarus Club is one of London's most prestigious gentlemen's clubs, counting amongst its members the very elite of society. Beneath the veneer of respectability, however, there swarm dark secrets, tense rivalries, blackmail, and murder.

Jacob Erskine is a man who can count many of the Icarus Club's members as his enemy. When Erskine is found shot dead in one of the reading rooms of the club, the police are baffled. Why was the dead man's body covered in bank notes? What is the relevance of a single feather found beside the body? Who had the opportunity to steal the revolver used to commit the crime from a locked desk? And who amongst them is a liar and a thief?

Everett Carr, retired judge and reluctant amateur sleuth, thinks he knows the answers to some of those questions. But as Carr digs deeper into the mystery of Jacob Erskine's death, it becomes apparent that more than one person had a motive for wishing him dead. When a second murder occurs, Carr comes to realise that the killer is someone far more deadly than even he had anticipated.

If Carr is to solve the murder, not only will he have to brave the very real dangers of the night, but he will also have to delve into the dark secrets of the past...