The Ritual Bath: A Novel (Peter Decker & Rina Lazarus Novels)

A report of rape in a Los Angeles yeshiva brings police detective Peter Decker into an insular Orthodox Jewish community but the strict religious practices and customs of the community prevent him from following his standard investigative procedures

enal...[The Ritual Bath] combines likable characters, a superb mystery plot, and valid insights into Jewish life."
MURDER INK
The quiet, ordered world of a yeshiva in the California hills is shattered when a woman is brutally raped as she returns from the mikvah, the bathhouse where women perform their cleansing ritual. Detective Peter Decker of the LAPD has never heard anything like it. And although most of the community refuses to talk to him, Rina Lazarus, the only witness, does, steering him through the maze of confusing religious laws that thwart his investigation at every turn. As the trail grows cold, Decker's only getting closer to Rina and not to the rapist--or is he? Maybe Rina wa the intended victim all along. And the rapist may not stop with rape the next time...