Legal Mystery

A deadly fall on a rugged stretch of California coast. A burglary gone wrong in Virginia. These incidents seem unrelated, but the victims were living undercover, their true identities closely held secrets. They are members of a classified team, the last line of defense against foreign threats. Now someone is assassinating them one by one, taking out family members and innocent bystanders to make the deaths seem like accidents.

Teaming up with longtime friends - NYPD's Mike Chapman and Mercer Wallace - Assistant D.A. Alex Cooper investigates the disappearance of world-famous dancer Natalya Galinova, who has suddenly vanished backstage at Lincoln Center's Metropolitan Opera House - during a performance. The three colleagues are soon drawn into the machinations of New York City's secretive theatrical community, where ambition takes many forms, including those most deadly.

Horace Rumpole - cigar-smoking, claret-drinking, Wordsworth-spouting defender of some unlikely clients - often speaks of the great murder trial which revealed his talents as an advocate and made his reputation down at the Bailey when he was still a young man. Now, for the first time, the sensational story of the Penge Bungalow Murders case is told in full: how, shortly after the war, Rumpole took on the seemingly impossible task of defending young Simon Jerold.

The McCarrans and the Gallaghers, two military families, have been close for decades, ever since Anthony McCarran—now one of the army's most distinguished generals—became best friends with Jack Gallagher, a fellow West Pointer who was later killed in Vietnam. Now a new generation of soldiers faces combat, and Lt. Brian McCarran, the general's son, has returned from a harrowing tour in Iraq. Traumatized by wartime experiences he will not reveal, Brian depends on his lifelong friendship with Kate Gallagher, Jack's daughter, who is married to Brian's commanding officer in Iraq.

Arthur Beauchamp, a heralded criminal lawyer, has moved to a quiet island off the British Columbia coast. While trying to recover from a marriage gone sour, his retirement is interrupted by his former law partners - they want Arthur to take charge of the defense trial of Jonathan O'Donnell, the acting dean of a law school. O'Donnell has been accused of rape by one of the students, Kimberley Martin, a smart but arrogant woman who is engaged to a rich businessman.

Mike Daley doesn't go to confession much since he left the priesthood twenty years ago and became a lawyer, but that doesn't stop his old friend, Father Ramon Aguirre, from trying to get him there. "It wouldn't kill you to go to church once in a while," he tells Mike. But it does kill someone. For several months, a ruinous sexual harassment suit has been building against the San Francisco Catholic Archdiocese, and when the plaintiff's lawyer is found dead, an almost audible sigh of relief is heard.

England, 1176. Aelred Barling, esteemed clerk to the justices of King Henry II, is dispatched from the royal court with his young assistant, Hugo Stanton, to investigate a brutal murder in a village outside York. The case appears straightforward. A suspect is under lock and key in the local prison, and the angry villagers are demanding swift justice. But when more bodies are discovered, certainty turns to doubt - and amid the chaos it becomes clear that nobody is above suspicion.

Seeing a dog next to a homeless man inspires lawyer Andy Carpenter to give the pair some money to help. Soon after Andy’s encounter with them, man and dog are attacked in the middle of the night on the street. The dog defends its new owner, and the erstwhile attacker is bitten but escapes. But the dog is quarantined, and the man, Don Carrigan, is heartbroken. Andy’s wife, Laurie, can’t resist helping the duo. In a matter of days, Don and his dog, Zoey, are living above Andy’s garage and become two new additions to the family. But things soon go awry....

Ruthless defense attorney Tatum Graham has been living large in Miami, but when his recently acquitted client claims another victim, Tatum has a crisis of conscience. Disillusioned, he heads to his small Utah hometown for a simpler life...but that’s not what he finds. Soon after he arrives, Tatum’s childhood crush offers him a job at the county attorney’s office and assigns him a murder case.

Grace Rossi is starting over after a divorce, and a part-time job with a federal appeals court sounds perfect. But she doesn't count on being assigned to an explosive death penalty appeal. Nor does she expect ardor in the court in the form of an affair with the chief judge. Then Grace finds herself investigating a murder, unearthing a secret bank account and following a trail of bribery and judicial corruption that's stumped even the FBI. In no time at all, Grace under fire takes on a whole new meaning.

Vengence will be theirs! The Bergman-Deketomis Law Firm built their powerhouse legal team fully understanding that their opponents rarely play by the rules, but the gruesome murder of one of their senior partners has placed them on a playing field where there are no rules. They are caught up in a way that has to be won outside of a courtroom. One of America's largest weapons manufacturers has them in its crosshairs, and a negotiated settlement is not an option. Sometimes the pursuit of justice isn't enough. Sometimes the law of vengeance is the only path.

Rusty is a retired judge attempting a third act in life with a loving soon-to-be wife, Bea, with whom he shares both a restful home on an idyllic lake in the rural Midwest and a plaintive hope that this marriage will be his best, and his last. But the peace that’s taken Rusty so long to find evaporates when Bea’s young adult son, Aaron, living under their supervision while on probation for drug possession, disappears. If Aaron doesn’t return soon, he will be sent back to jail.

Cleveland lawyer Casey Cort lost more than her job when she crossed the wrong political family—she lost her idealism. Casey’s scraped together a career as a solo practitioner which has offered her more than one opportunity for redemption…but it's also threatened her life. In Judged, one thread is pulled and everything unravels. In Ransomed, Casey faces the Brodys again. The Brody family destroyed her. Now they want her back. In Caged, Casey Cort must decide between violation of her sworn duty of confidentiality or forging a path to justice.

In Wolf's Revenge, the fifth novel in Lachlan Smith's Shamus Award-winning series, attorney-detective Leo Maxwell seeks an exit strategy from his family's deepening entanglement with a ruthless prison-based gang. Caught between the criminals and the FBI, Leo charts his own path in defending a young woman who was manipulated into brazenly murdering a member of the Aryan Brotherhood in San Francisco's Tenderloin neighborhood.

Kerry McGrath had only begun to work in the county prosecutor's office at the time of the infamous "Sweetheart Murder Case" - the bizarre slaying years ago of strikingly beautiful Suzanne Reardon. Now, 10 years later, Kerry has gained a reputation as a smart and relentless prosecutor - so much so that her name has been given to the governor as a candidate for a new judgeship - and her new life and career are in full swing.

Mary DiNunzio gets a terrifying telephone call while she's working late, then goes home to find a shadow lurking at her front door. When a lawyer close to her turns up dead, Mary begins to suspect that the case she's been working on, involving the suicide of an Italian-American in an internment camp during World War II, may not be ancient history after all.

When an investment guru turns up dead in the septic tank behind her husband's new Wyoming lodge, Jennifer must put the campaign that could make her the youngest ever female district attorney in Houston on hold to defend the well-lubricated lodge caretaker, or he'll go down for a murder she's convinced he didn't commit.

New York Times best-selling author Sandra Brown's latest romantic thriller is set against the lively and decadent backdrop of New Orleans - where, to avenge the acquittal of his partner's murderer, a policeman kidnaps the defense lawyer's wife.

When nineteen-year-old Jill Moss goes missing near the Utah-Arizona border, everyone has an opinion. Only Norma Gallagher, a search and rescue volunteer, knows the real story. Norma’s already found Jill, huddled in a cave and terrified that her abusive boyfriend, Jake, will kill her. If he ever sees her again. To protect Jill from a dangerous man, Norma quietly delivers the girl to her grateful parents in California, even though she’s conflicted. Keeping Jill safe and hidden from Jake, the press, and the public will be their secret. But secrets can’t last forever.

When a high-end hooker crashes the party and ends up dead, shameful secrets of prominent men hang in the balance. The kind of secrets that get folks killed. Chance Meridian and his murder squad soon learn that the dead woman had a penchant for playing dangerous games with the wrong people. Powerful people—including a United States Senator whose decades-old hatred of Chance still burns hot. As past and present converge to put him in a vise, Chance discovers a hard truth about his line of work. Some cases can only be solved at the point of a gun.