Book Description

From an award-winning author, a crime thriller with “some of the sharpest courtroom cut-and-thrust since Presumed Innocent” (Kirkus Reviews). The Maxwell brothers both became lawyers, following in their father’s footsteps. But their father, Lawrence, had his career come to a screeching halt over two decades ago—when he was convicted of killing his wife. Now, faced with evidence of stunning prosecutorial misconduct, a San Francisco judge has ordered a new trial for Lawrence. Soon after, a prison snitch and potential key witness turns up dead, and Lawrence’s son, Leo, finds himself trying to defend his father against murder charges both old and new—and confronting the darkness at the center of his own life, as he struggles to do right by both the law and his blood. From the author of Bear Is Broken, which won the Shamus Award and was a Kirkus Reviews best book of the year, this novel in the Leo Maxwell series is “a sharp-edged legal thriller with the deep emotional undertones of family drama and tragedy” (New York Times–bestselling author Reed Farrel Coleman). “Superlative . . . Smith is masterly in creating realistic courtroom scenes, including the subtleties of witness examination.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review “The line Maxwell family members walk between innocence and guilt becomes more blurred with every step and turn of the page.” —Library Journal, starred review