Case of Lies (Nina Reilly Series #11) »

Perri O’Shaughnessy is the pen name for sisters Mary and Pamela O’Shaughnessy, who both live in California. They are the authors of eleven bestselling Nina Reilly novels as well as a collection of short crime fiction, Sinister Shorts.

For Nina Reilly, the mountain town of Lake Tahoe is home. It’s where she forged a successful career as a tough, resourceful attorney - and raised her teenage son, Bob, alone. Back from a stint in Monterey, where her love life took a tumble, Nina has returned to her Tahoe law office with her old friends Sandy Whitefeather and Sandy’s son, Wish. It isn’t long before she has a new client whose wife was shot and killed during a casino-district robbery two years before. The police have no suspects, and the robbery victims, three students, lied about their identities and are hiding outside California and the reach of the court.

Two of the witnesses have fled to a village not far from the home of Bob’s father, Kurt Scott, in Germany. As Nina tries to unravel the mystery of one violent Tahoe night, a harrowing journey begins - one that takes her from the dark underworld of Tahoe’s casinos to the halls of a prestigious East Coast university to Europe and an emotional reunion with Kurt. As old feelings are rekindled, Nina’s case turns violent. Everyone has something to hide - the brilliant but unstable mathematics student who has made an astonishing discovery, the owner of a motel where the shooting took place, and the shooter, who has turned the whole case into a gigantic lie.

Publishers Weekly

A math genius, a tough courtroom adversary and an even tougher judge make the 11th legal thriller in the Nina Reilly series (Unlucky in Law, etc.) the most intriguing yet. Back in Lake Tahoe, Nina gets her next case from a masseuse whose aunt was killed during a motel robbery. Unless Nina acts, the lawsuit filed against the Ace High Lodge will be dismissed, as no one has been able to locate the witnesses. Reluctant to call on ex-lover PI Paul van Wagoner for help, Nina hires her assistant's PI son, Wish, who discovers that the witnesses are MIT students with a sideline counting cards. While the old case takes on new life, people connected to it are threatened and worse. O'Shaughnessy (lawyer Pamela and editor Mary O'Shaughnessy) takes the reader inside the beautiful mind of emotionally immature, occasionally delusional, quantitatively inspired Elliott Wakefield as he solves equations, cares for his father and plays blackjack. In thrillers as in math proofs, neatness counts. Here, the Internet and national security bring Elliott's story to an almost too-neat conclusion, while Nina ingeniously solves the problem of replacing Paul in her personal life. As always, O'Shaughnessy keeps legal procedure straight, language crisp and plot consistently absorbing. Agent, Nancy Yost. (July) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.