CARROLL QUINT is the entertainment critic for the San Francisco Bulletin. He doesn't earn a lot of money, but the job does give him a certain place in the city's after-dark world, and he loves seeing the newest play, or the newest movie, and writing about them for his readers. His job, however, gets harder for him to do when friends of his start showing up dead, each one in some way connected to the entertainment industry. Someone calling himself Thanatos, the Greek god of death, is sending him e-mails, taunting him with clues from Alfred Hitchcock movies regarding the next target. With each murder, the police become more suspicious of Quint, who they figure is sending the e-mails to himself. Quint must race to find the killer, but danger is closer to him than he realizes.