(Like a spatter of fallen stars they were the victims of the Strangler...As Detective Aidan Cummings broods over the few pieces of evidence - a scrap under a nail, a few grains of sand - Briege O"Neill"s life has begun to resemble some malevolent fairytale: her brother has died of cancer, her Garda niece has been shot. She knows that misfortunes happen in threes . . .Then a body is found in Granny"s Wood)