New York, New York. If you can make it there, the saying goes, you can make it anywhere. The political big wigs of the city would love for the LA entertainment industry put that theory into practice, and as such have rolled out the red carpet for a huge, weeklong “Hollywood on the Hudson” event intended to lure West coast producers, directors, and actors to the Big Apple for their future film projects.

The NYPD Red task force was originally assembled to give special service and attention to the city’s rich and famous, whose money and opinion have tremendous influence on the city’s structure and reputation. Already a high profile, high stress job, the additional influx of all the A-List out-of-towners puts the members of NYPD Red on 24/7 duty to ensure things run smoothly during the “Hollywood on the Hudson” event.

Of course, we wouldn’t have much of a book if things went smoothly.

The first hitch in the giddyap occurs when a famous, and infamous, Hollywood producer keels over and dies during his power breakfast at a crowded, upscale Manhattan restaurant. Though the restaurant owners and city brass would love to write it off as a heart attack, less bad publicity that way, NYPD Red Detective Zach Jordan and his partner, Detective Kylie MacDonald, aren’t so sure. The way the witnesses describe the producer behaving right before his death sounds suspiciously like poisoning, and when another Hollywood icon goes down later the same morning in a spectacularly violent, and public, manner there is no longer any doubt – “Hollywood on the Hudson” is under attack. →