Best of
Legal-Thriller

2021

Next of Kin


Kia Abdullah - 2021
    Her brother-in-law’s voice is filled with panic. He’s at his son’s nursery to pick up Max. But he isn’t there.YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE…Leila was supposed to drop Max off that morning. But she forgot.Racing to the carpark, she grasps the horror of what she has done. Max has been locked in her car for six hours on the hottest day of the year.IS ABOUT TO COME TRUE…But she’s too late.What follows is an explosive, high-profile trial, that will tear the family apart. But as the case progresses it becomes clear there’s more to this incident than meets the eye…A gripping, brave and tense courtroom drama, Next of Kin will keep you on the edge of your seat until the final, heart-stopping page.

Defending Innocence


Peter Kirkland - 2021
    Now he’s back in his hometown to hit restart and repair the relationship with his troubled son. But the past is always present in a small town.Leland returns to find his high school sweetheart hasn’t had the easiest of lives—especially now that her son faces a death sentence for murdering his father. Yet what appears to be an open and shut case is anything but. As Leland digs deeper to uncover a truth even his client is determined to keep buried, a tangled web of corruption weaves its way throughout his once tranquil hometown.Leland soon realizes it’s not just his innocent young client’s life that’s at stake—powerful forces surface to threaten the precious few loved ones he has left.

Splitsville


William Bernhardt - 2021
    A bitter custody battle. A deadly fire. This case could cost Kenzi her career—and her life.Kenzi Rivera is furious. Passed over for promotion at her own father’s firm, the talented divorce lawyer is tired of fighting chauvinism every single day. When a desperate scientist begs for help getting her daughter back, Kenzi can’t resist…even though this client is involved in Hexitel, a group she calls her religion but others call a cult.Kenzi uncovers evidence of disturbing practices at Hexitel involving large sums of money, servitude, and sex. She also learns her client’s lab has been plagued by death threats and cutthroat competition. After the workplace burns to the ground and her client is charged with murder, the ambitious attorney knows there is much more at stake than a simple custody dispute.Can Kenzi find a path to the truth before she’s trapped in a maze of death?Splitsville is the dramatic first book in the Splitsville Legal Thriller series. If you like gutsy heroines, diverse characters, and page-turning suspense, then you’ll love William Bernhardt’s twisty tale.

The Crimson Trial


Freya Atwood - 2021
    The more she digs deeper into this new profound murder, the more complex it all becomes.But little did she know, this is a town with crimson walls. Dark scandals that people pretend never happened and shocking tales relating to the case hide behind a carefully constructed mask. And Laura has to get to the bottom of this before her client is pronounced dead and her reputation is forever ruined.The Crimson Trial is Freya's debut novel in the Laura Jones series of blood-pumping legal thrillers. If you are an avid fan of strong female leads, action-packed courtroom drama, riveting characters and mind-blowing murder mystery, then you'll love Freya's intriguing story.

Cynical Justice


Freya Atwood - 2021
    A dark truth that threatens to unleash.Robin Lane has had enough of impossible cases and stubborn clients. Wishing to escape her own mistakes, her return to her hometown takes a turn when she must defend an innocent woman accused of a brutal murder. For Robin is having a hard time believing that her high school friend plunged a knife twenty-seven times in a man's chest.As the case unfolds, dark confessions come to the surface. Her client knows too much, but says too little. More witnesses come to light, but it all seems hopeless against the biggest coverup the state has ever seen. Because two can keep a secret if one of them is dead.Cynical Justice is Freya's debut novel in the Robin Lane series of blood-pumping legal thrillers. If you are an avid fan of strong female leads, action-packed courtroom drama, riveting characters and mind-blowing murder mystery, then you'll love Freya's intriguing story.

Silent Screams


Neenv Raju Akunuri - 2021
    Jai Singh, the husband of the victim, is considered the prime suspect of the murder after ACP Jason sahayam takes up the case. Naseen decides to defend Jai in the court, only because she believes, the man who loved her best friend as dearly as Jai, couldn't have hurt her. Contrary to naseen’s conviction, could Jai really have killed his wife? Was there trouble in paradise that naseen wasn't aware of? Set in Chennai, the story goes on to unfold closely guarded secrets that now stand the risk of coming out, that’ll make Jai, naseen and Jason question their true selves.

A Time for Justice: A Legal Thriller


Freya Atwood - 2021
    When a lawyer decides to unveil it twenty years later, she must fight against her family and city to find the truth…As a stubborn and quick-witted lawyer, Zoe Caine has been trying to catch her big case for far too long. And the chance presents itself, the moment a traumatized woman begs her to uncover a horrifying injustice committed by the town’s beloved people. An unspoken crime Zoe knows firsthand.Contemplating whether she should risk her career, Zoe soon learns that nothing remains secret. When the woman is found injured and near-dead, she decides to investigate. Only to find a truth that should have remained hidden away. They were raised in the same abusive facility. Twenty years ago.The case has turned personal and Zoe knows she only has one chance to make this right. And when people threaten her life, the court is her only hope. Until the corruption that follows…A Time for Justice is Freya's 1st novel in the Zoe Caine series of blood-pumping legal thrillers. If you are an avid fan of strong female leads, action-packed courtroom drama, riveting characters and mind-blowing murder mystery, then you'll love Freya's intriguing story.

The Tannery


Michael A. Almond - 2021
    . . Some of this tale will sound disturbingly familiar to readers in the 21st Century, all the more reason to consider its lessons. History can come alive in a work of great fiction. This is one of those times." -Frye Gaillard, Civil RightsHistorian, Author of A Hard Rain: America in the 1960sJuly 5, 1900, Wilkes County, North Carolina: The beautiful young daughter of tannery owner Jakob Schumann is found dead on the north bank of the Yadkin River, brutally beaten, a skinning knife in her chest.Who killed Rachel Schumann? And why? Ambitious Wilkes prosecutor Vincent Taliaferro has arrested Virgil Wade, a mixed-race boy, and is convinced the case is open and shut. But local lawyer Ben Waterman is not so sure. Ben's investigation uncovers evidence that undermines the prosecutor's case and points in an entirely different direction. But can he prove it? Can he convince an all-White, all-male jury of Virgil's innocence?The Tannery transports readers to the turbulent world of the post-Reconstruction South. Reflecting issues prominent in today's headlines, themes of Black voter suppression and intimidation, the violence and depravity of vigilante "justice," and the rise of Jim Crow drive the narrative to its dramatic and surprising conclusion.

Calculated Risk


L.G. Westlake - 2021