Baby's First Felony


Book Description

Shamus Award–winner John Straley returns to his critically acclaimed Cecil Younger detective series, set in Sitka, Alaska, a land of perfect beauty and not-so-perfect locals. Criminal defense investigator Cecil Younger spends his days coaching would-be felons on how to avoid incriminating themselves. He even likes most of the rough characters who seek his services. So when Sherrie, a returning client, asks him to track down some evidence to clear her of a domestic violence charge, Cecil agrees. Maybe he’ll find something that will get her abusive boyfriend locked up for good. Cecil treks out to the shady apartment complex only to discover the “evidence” is a large pile of cash—fifty thousand dollars, to be exact. That is how Cecil finds himself in violation of one of his own maxims: Nothing good comes of walking around with a lot of someone else’s money. In this case, “nothing good” turns out to be a deep freeze full of drug-stuffed fish, a murder witnessed at close range, and a kidnapping—his teenage daughter, Blossom, is snatched as collateral for his cooperation. The reluctant, deeply unlucky investigator turns to an unlikely source for help: the misfit gang of clients he’s helped to defend over the years. Together, they devise a plan to free Blossom and restore order to Sitka. But when your only hope for justice lies in the hands of a group of criminals, things don’t always go according to plan.




Baby's First Felony


Book Description

Shamus Award–winner John Straley returns to his critically acclaimed Cecil Younger detective series, set in Sitka, Alaska, a land of perfect beauty and not-so-perfect locals. Criminal defense investigator Cecil Younger spends his days coaching would-be felons on how to avoid incriminating themselves. He even likes most of the rough characters who seek his services. So when Sherrie, a returning client, asks him to track down some evidence to clear her of a domestic violence charge, Cecil agrees. Maybe he’ll find something that will get her abusive boyfriend locked up for good. Cecil treks out to the shady apartment complex only to discover the “evidence” is a large pile of cash—fifty thousand dollars, to be exact. That is how Cecil finds himself in violation of one of his own maxims: Nothing good comes of walking around with a lot of someone else’s money. In this case, “nothing good” turns out to be a deep freeze full of drug-stuffed fish, a murder witnessed at close range, and a kidnapping—his teenage daughter, Blossom, is snatched as collateral for his cooperation. The reluctant, deeply unlucky investigator turns to an unlikely source for help: the misfit gang of clients he’s helped to defend over the years. Together, they devise a plan to free Blossom and restore order to Sitka. But when your only hope for justice lies in the hands of a group of criminals, things don’t always go according to plan.




So Far and Good


Book Description

To his chagrin, Alaskan PI Cecil Younger learns his teenage daughter has launched her own detective agency. But when her first case goes awry, she’s going to need some help from an unlikely source: her father, who’s currently locked up in prison. The verdict from the three-judge panel is in. Cecil Younger, bumbling criminal defense investigator and totally embarrassing father, has been sentenced to seven-and-a-half years in prison for his involvement in . . . well, a number of things, ranging from destruction of private property to killing a guy. But compared to the original twenty-five-year sentence, it's not so bad. His success with getting his sentence reduced has attracted the attention of his fellow inmates, and one man, "Fourth Street," reaches out for advice for his upcoming parole hearing in exchange for protection and companionship. When he isn't reading Adrienne Rich or James Baldwin with Fourth Street, Cecil spends his time filling up large yellow legal pads. He writes, mostly, about his teenage daughter, Blossom, who is on a Nancy Drew–like quest to help her friend, George, discover the truth about her biological parents, which turns out to be complicated. Shortly after submitting a mail-in genetics test, George learns she is the infamous "Baby Jane Doe" who was kidnapped from her Native mother shortly after she was born. A media and legal circus quickly ensues, and George's reunion with her birth family isn’t the heartwarming story the journalists hoped it would be. There is an even darker secret about the baby-snatching case, a secret threatens to destroy not just George’s family—but Cecil’s as well.




Three Felonies a Day


Book Description

"The average professional in this country wakes up in the morning, goes to work, comes home, eats dinner and then goes to sleep, unaware that he or she has likely committted several federal crimes that day ... Why?" This book explores the answer to the question, reveals how the federal criminal justice system has become dangerously disconnected from common law traditions of due process and the law's expectations and surprises the reader with its insight.




Cold Water Burning


Book Description

After years on the job as a private investigator in Sitka, Alaska, Cecil Younger doesn’t claim to have learned much about humanity as a whole, but he does know this: truth is a slippery thing. When the wife of a former client asks Cecil to find her husband, Cecil agrees. After all, helping to get Richard exonerated during a tragic murder trial three years ago was one of the biggest successes of Cecil’s career. But why, if Richard’s name was cleared, is he MIA now? Patricia, Richard’s steadfast wife, has one guess: someone is after him. It’s no secret that Richard has a long list of enemies, not least of which are the family members of the dead. But things soon get complicated when Patricia is killed, sending Cecil on a desperate trip to sea to chase down the twisted truth.




The Girl from Felony Bay


Book Description

The Girl from Felony Bay is a fresh, vibrant, funny, and heartwarming debut in the vein of Sheila Turnage's Three Times Lucky and Clare Vanderpool's Moon over Manifest. Set on a southern plantation, it's about a young girl named Abbey, her best friend, Bee, and a hundred-year-old mystery. The last year has been a rough one for Abbey Force. Her father has been in a coma since his accident, in which he was framed for a terrible crime he didn't commit. And their home, Reward Plantation, had to be sold to pay off his debt to society. So Abbey is stuck living with her Uncle Charlie, who isn't exactly an ideal role model. But things just got more interesting. The new family who moved in to Reward Plantation has a daughter named Bee, and she's just as curious as Abbey is about the No Trespassing signs and holes being dug out of Felony Bay. It seems like someone has been poking around a mystery that dates all the way back to the Civil War—and it just might be the same someone who framed Abbey's father.




Cold Storage, Alaska


Book Description

An offbeat, often hilarious crime novel set in the sleepy Alaskan town of Cold Storage from the Shamus Award winning author of the Cecil Younger series. Cold Storage, Alaska, is a remote fishing outpost where salmonberries sparkle in the morning frost and where you just might catch a King Salmon if you’re zen enough to wait for it. Settled in 1935 by Norse fishermen who liked to skinny dip in its natural hot springs, the town enjoyed prosperity at the height of the frozen fish boom. But now the cold storage plant is all but abandoned and the town is withering. Clive “The Milkman” McCahon returns to his tiny Alaska hometown after a seven-year jail stint for dealing coke. He has a lot to make up to his younger brother, Miles, who has dutifully been taking care of their ailing mother. But Clive doesn’t realize the trouble he’s bringing home. His vengeful old business partner is hot on his heels, a stick-in-the-mud State Trooper is dying to bust Clive for narcotics, and, to complicate everything, Clive might be going insane—lately, he’s been hearing animals talking to him. Will his arrival in Cold Storage be a breath of fresh air for the sleepy, depopulated town? Or will Clive’s arrival turn the whole place upside down?




Felony Murder


Book Description

The felony murder doctrine is one of the most widely criticized features of American criminal law. Legal scholars almost unanimously condemn it as irrational, concluding that it imposes punishment without fault and presumes guilt without proof. Despite this, the law persists in almost every U.S. jurisdiction. Felony Murder is the first book on this controversial legal doctrine. It shows that felony murder liability rests on a simple and powerful idea: that the guilt incurred in attacking or endangering others depends on one's reasons for doing so. Inflicting harm is wrong, and doing so for a bad motive—such as robbery, rape, or arson—aggravates that wrong. In presenting this idea, Guyora Binder criticizes prevailing academic theories of criminal intent for trying to purge criminal law of moral judgment. Ultimately, Binder shows that felony murder law has been and should remain limited by its justifying aims.




Snap


Book Description

A teenage boy hunts for his mother’s killer in this Man Booker Prize-longlisted novel by “the true heir to the great Ruth Rendell” (Mail on Sunday, UK). Just before Jack’s mother disappeared up the road to get help, she put the eleven-year-old boy in charge of his two sister. As they wait for her on the shoulder of the road in their stifling, broken-down car, the three children bicker, whine and play I-Spy. But their mother never comes back. And after that long, hot summer’s day, nothing will ever be the same again. At fifteen-years-old, Jack is still in charge—supporting his sisters any way he can while evading social services. Meanwhile, a young woman across town wakes to find a knife beside her bed, and a note reading I could of killed you. The police are tracking a mysterious burglar they call Goldilocks, for his habit of sleeping in the beds of the houses he robs. But the woman doesn’t see the point of involving the police. And Jack, very suddenly, may be on the verge of finding out who killed his mother. The Gold Dagger Award-winning author of Blacklands reaffirms her reputation for masterful, twisty crime fiction with this “unnerving suspense novel” (Marilyn Stasio, The New York Times).




Accidental Felons


Book Description