Supreme Justice »

While his love for Perry Mason novels inspired him to spend 25 years as a criminal defense attorney, Phillip Margolin eventually left the courtroom to pen his own authoritative, twist-laden legal thrillers, including Gone but Not Forgotten and Ties That Bind.

New York Times bestselling author Phillip Margolin returns to the corridors of power in Washington, D.C., with an exciting thriller about a ghost ship and the President's nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Sarah Woodruff, on death row in Oregon for murdering her lover, John Finley, has appealed her case to the Supreme Court just when a prominent justice resigns, leaving a vacancy.

Then, for no apparent reason, another justice is mysteriously attacked. Dana Cutler—one of the heroes from Margolin's bestselling Executive Privilege—is quietly called in to investigate. She looks for links between the Woodruff appeal and the ominous incidents in the justices' chambers, which eventually lead her to a shoot-out that took place years ago on a small freighter docked upriver in Shelby, Oregon, containing a dead crew and illegal drugs. The only survivor on board? John Finley.

With the help of Brad Miller and Keith Evans, Dana uncovers a plot by a rogue element in the American intelligence community involving the president's nominee to the Supreme Court, and soon the trio is thrown back into the grips of a deadly, executive danger.

With nonstop action, Supreme Justice picks up where Executive Privilege left off, putting readers right back where they were—on the edge of their seats.

Publishers Weekly

In this entertaining if predictable sequel to Executive Privilege (2008) from Margolin, policewoman Sarah Woodruff, who's on death row in Oregon, has been tried twice for murdering her lover, John Finley. Sarah's life depends on an appeal to the Supreme Court, but her appeal, if heard, could expose a criminal plot within the CIA. An unexpected vacancy in the court provides one opportunity to quash Woodruff's attempted appeal. For the man at the center of the plot, however, this isn't enough, and a Supreme Court justice becomes a target for assassination. Once again PI Dana Cutler and law clerk Brad Miller find themselves investigating dastardly doings in Washington, D.C., involving a host of conventional characters, from scheming Beltway sachems to a ghetto-raised African-American justice. Thriller fans who like to see the villains receive their just rewards and the good guys come to no harm will find this a comforting read. (June)