Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Preposterous, but eminently suspenseful, legal procedural about a Mississippi river town's buried secrets, by the author of Mortal Fear (1996), etc. Penn Cage, once a Texas prosecutor, now an infinitely wealthy bestselling lawyer-novelist, can—t get over the recent cancer death of his wife, and is just a bit troubled about death threats from the brother of a demented white supremacist he put on death row. After a vacation in Disney World with his daughter Annie, Cage embarks on an extended visit with his parents in Natchez, Tennessee, where he finds that Ray Presley, a white-trash former cop is blackmailing Penn's saintly physician father. It seems that Presley filched a gun from the good doctor, then used it in an unsolved murder. Now, Penn buys back the gun from Presley with a mountain of cash, and later sits down for a famous author interview with the young, rich, beautiful, and brainy Caitlin Masters, the Pulitzer-crazed publisher of the local newspaper, during which he mentions, in passing, a 1968 racially motivated murder of Del Peyton, a young, black factory worker that both the police and the FBI failed to solve. Masters prints her interview, stirring up old animosities all over, including a rancorous legal dispute between Cage's father and Judge Leo Marston, a local powerbroker who was a district attorney at the time. Peyton's widow suddenly appears and asks the famous writer to find who killed her husband. Penn reluctantly agrees, then runs into his old girlfriend, Livy Marston, Leo's flawless, southern-belle daughter. Livy mysteriously ditched Cage 20 years ago, but now can't wait to stoke the old fire. Meanwhile, FBI Director John Portman, Cage's old nemesis, weighs in with nasty threats as Cage braves bullies, dodges bullets, rides down icy rapids, and prepares for a courtroom battle. Breezy, Grisham-style read that tweaks the conventions of southern gothic. (Author tour) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Library Journal
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

After his wife dies, all Penn Cage wants is to return to some peace and quiet in his home town of Natchez, MS. Instead, he finds that his father is being blackmailed and that the judge on a long-unsolved murder case might just be implicated. From the author of the best-selling Spandau Phoenix. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Library Journal
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Months after his wife's death, Houston prosecutor Penn Cage returns with his young daughter to Natchez, MS, seeking solace in his hometown. Cage, also a best-selling crime novelist, finds anything but peace as he stumbles into a 30-year-old racially motivated murder. As one secret after another is revealed, Cage discovers evidence implicating his father's greatest enemy as well as the director of the FBI; now his life and the safety of his family are in jeopardy. Iles (24 Hours) is a master of what might be called the Southern Gothic, and this is one of his best despite some laughable excesses. His tale begins with everything falling predictably into place, but as Cage filters through an intricate network of lies, the case becomes much more complicated, with enough melodrama to fill five novels. Reader Tom Stechschulte provides nuances for the many regional accents, though he makes some characters caricatures. Recommended for public libraries. Michael Adams, CUNY Graduate Ctr. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Publishers Weekly
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Although it takes place in Natchez, Miss., and is flavored with the violence and seamy undertones of a Southern Gothic, this fourth thriller by Iles (Spandau Phoenix) owes just as much to a familiar parallel universe where wealthy male lawyers double as tragic heroes, women are invariably smart and attractive, and trials are by definition "high profile." After his wife's death, Penn Cage, a former Houston prosecutor and a bestselling suspense novelist, retreats to his parents' home in Natchez with his grieving young daughter. The healing process is interrupted when Cage learns that someone is blackmailing his father, a saintly family doctor who once made a lethal mistake. In tracing the source of his father's moral dilemma, Cage stumbles upon a trail of lies surrounding the unsolved murder of a black man in 1968. He determines to reopen the case, even though his antebellum hometown is smoldering with racial tension. With the assistance of Caitlin Masters, the attractive, smart and ambitious publisher of the local newspaper, Cage gradually uncovers an intricate conspiracy that reaches up to the highest levels of the FBI. Forced to confront powerful Judge Leo Marston, who nearly destroyed his father in pursuing an unrelated, unfounded malpractice accusation decades before, Cage must also face Marston's daughter, Livy, his old high school sweetheart, who tries to persuade Cage to let sleeping dogs lie. It is difficult at times to sympathize with Cage, who proselytizes about truth, justice and obligation, yet destroys evidence to protect his father and fails to properly shield his loved ones as he single-mindedly pursues the case. Still, this ably crafted, richly atmospheric legal thriller is engrossing, and readers will forgive Iles's protagonist a few shortcomings. Agent, Aaron Priest. Major ad/promo; 15-city author tour; British rights to Hodder Headline; audio rights to Recorded Books. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Book list
From Booklist, Copyright © American Library Association. Used with permission.

Penn Cage, in his late thirties and a prosecutor in Houston with a reputation for being firm, has given up practicing law to write novels. Now that his wife has died, and so prematurely, he decides to take himself and his little girl back to live in his hometown of Natchez, Mississippi. No sooner has he stepped foot into this lovely old river town than something from his distinguished father's presumably spotless past rears its ugly head, as does something from the community's racist past. Cage learns that his father is being blackmailed. Also, because of comments Cage made, right after moving back, to the new newspaper publisher about the unsolved murder of a black man three decades ago, the relatives of the victim come to Cage pleading to get the case reopened. Comparisons to John Grisham's novels are inevitable, but Iles certainly does not suffer from the comparison as he builds a deliciously complicated plot that explores the correlation between his father's blackmail and the 30-year-old apparently racist murder. As Cage pursues evidence, the trail leads all the way back to J. Edgar Hoover's FBI and concludes in a Natchez courtroom. In the meantime, Cage gets so personally involved that his investigation takes on the sheen of a vendetta as he seeks vengeance for wrongs done to him when he used to live in Natchez. --Brad Hooper

Library Journal
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

A decision to give up a lucrative law practice in Houston and return to his home town in Natchez, MS, plunges author/ attorney Penn Cage headlong into a 30-year-old unsolved murder with all the trappings of a civil rights case. Penn's motives smack of personal vendetta, since the man he suspects of planning the murder is a powerful former state's attorney and judge who tried to ruin the medical practice of Penn's father through an unsuccessful malpractice suit several years earlier. As Penn probes into the murder, he begins to discover an FBI cover-up, thrusting his family into a life-threatening situation. Iles (Mortal Fear) has penned a Southern superthriller that rivals John Grisham's best. Fast-paced action, surprise tactics, and down-and-dirty legal maneuvering played out below the surface calm of the deep South will transfix the reader to the very last page. Recommended for all public libraries. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 5/1/99.]ÄThomas L. Kilpatrick, Southern Illinois Univ. Lib., Carbondale (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.