At a fund-raising concert, while his girlfriend, rock n'roll star Stacy Tarrant, is performing, ambitious US Senator James Kilcannon is shot dead, point blank.
Fiercely independent attorney Tony Lord defends the assassin, Vietnam vet Harry Carson, in a televised trial, the media event of the year.
At their posh country club, the wife of conservative media magnate Colby Parnell is taken hostage - and joins Stacy Tarrant's manager in the violent grip of a man called Phoenix.
Now, on every TV set in America, dazed viewers are forced to join the most bizarre audience participation scheme ever devised - or the hostages will die on the air.
