Dark Lady » (AMERICAN)

Richard North Patterson studied fiction writing with Jesse Hill Ford at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. He has written ten novels, including the international bestsellers Degree of Guilt, Eyes of a Child, The Final Judgment, Silent Witness, and No Safe Place. Patterson lives with his wife, Laurie, and their family in San Francisco and on Martha's Vineyard.

In Steelton, a newly revitalized city, two prominent men are found dead. One, Tommy Fielding, a senior officer of a company building a new baseball stadium appears to have died from an accidental overdose of heroin. The other, Jack Novak, the local drug dealers' attorney is the victim of a ritual murder. But in each case the character of the dead man seems contradicted by the particulars of his death. Coincidence or connection? The question falls to Assistant County Prosecutor Stella Marz, called the Dark Lady by defense lawyers for her relentless, sometimes ruthless style. Making her way through a maze of corruption, deceit, and greed, trusting no one, Stella comes to believe that the search for the truth involves the bleak history of Steelton itself - a history that now endangers her future, and perhaps her life.

USA Today - Deirdre Donahue

Stella makes Dark Lady shine.