The Understudy

A Novel

By: Morgan Richter

Narrated by: Lisa Flanagan

An opera singer uncovers the dark secrets of her cruel and alluring understudy when a murder disrupts her disciplined world.

"The first time my understudy tried to kill me was on the day we met. We got off on the wrong foot, Yolanda and I, and while most of that was due to Yolanda being a very . . . complicated individual, some of the blame lies with me..."

After years of rigorous instruction and ensemble work, Kit finally gets her big break when she’s hired to play the lead role in a new opera based on the 1960s cult classic film Barbarella. Entrusted with playing the beautiful and seductive titular role, Kit is on her way to the top of the highly competitive world of New York City opera. But then she walks into rehearsal and meets her understudy. Stunning, suggestive, and bursting with the unbridled confidence of a novice, Yolanda is physically everything Barbarella is meant to be. At first, Kit isn’t threatened by the neophyte, until Yolanda reveals that she wants the role—and will do anything to get it.

As Yolanda's schemes become increasingly more reckless, she draws an unwitting Kit into her orbit. But when a brutal murder destabilizes the company and threatens her role, Kit discovers that Yolanda's glamorous veneer conceals something much more sinister. Hunting down the betrayed friends and discarded lovers from Yolanda’s past and unearthing secrets she’s worked hard to bury, Kit realizes just how far Yolanda is willing to go to get what she wants, and the number of enemies she made in the process.

Critic reviews

"A bouquet of bravas to Morgan Richter for The Understudy, her look at backstage intrigue—and murder—at a small New York opera company about to debut its version of the movie Barbarella. . . . Any lover of behind-the-scenes backstabbing should enjoy this. . . ." —Air Mail

"Richter follows up her debut The Divide (2024) with another gripping noir, this one set in the cutthroat world of Manhattan opera. . . . Richter peels back the curtains on the world of professional opera in a second outing that's tense, taut, and compulsively readable." —Booklist

"A razor-edged thriller set amid the rarefied world of opera performers. . . . Richter delivers soapy backstage dynamics and gasp-worthy twists. It’s a satisfying nail-biter." —Publishers Weekly

" Richter (The Divide) delivers plenty of show-stopping moments. . . . From dress rehearsals and deaths through final flowers, feathers, and fanaticism, Richter’s novel stays mostly at fever pitch in a way that will intrigue even readers who don’t give a fig about opera’s theatrics." —Library Journal

"Richter’s new slow-burn thriller centers on opera singer who has finally secured her place in the upper echelons of the New York scene and the understudy who proves herself to be more than merely a young rival, but something far more dangerous. Richter’s novel is tautly drawn but still full of wonderful detail from the life cycle of a big operatic production. . . . Readers will find themselves fully immersed in this thoughtful page turner." —Crime Reads (The Best Psychological Thrillers of 2025)

Opera Complicata

A little too formulaic, but pretty convincing. Protagonist was a little too boring, a little too plain.