The Addison brothers, Harry and Danny, have been estranged for many years, but when Danny calls from Rome pleading for Harry to get in touch, his brother doesn't ignore him. Except it seems he is too late, as Danny was on board a tourist bus which was blown apart by a bomb.
Matthew Shardlake, the marvelous hunchbacked 16th-century attorney who first appeared in Sansom's Dissolution, returns in this spellbinding Tudor-era tale of murder, conspiracy and betrayal. Shardlake normally handles property cases and the occasional dangerous mission for Lord Thomas Cromwell, the king's high counselor. Now he is engaged to defend a young woman accused of a curious murder, and the case seems hopeless. The girl refuses to speak and, under English law, unless she offers a plea in court she will be slowly crushed to death.
Edgar Prees, director of the Botanical Gardens In Asslington, is a man of such regular habits that when he is two hours late coming home one evening his daughter becomes quite alarmed. And rightly so, for Prees has, or so It seems, tried to commit suicide by trying to throw himself off a cliff. He is stopped, but the next morning, even as he still seems to be thinking about killing himself, he is murdered. Or does he kill himself?
Added by: Kahena | Karma: 11526.37 | Fiction literature | 21 August 2011
2
Choice of Evil
When his girlfriend, Crystal Beth, is gunned down at a gay rights rally in Central Park, Burke, the underground man-for-hire and expert hunter of predators, vows vengeance. But someone beats him to the task: a shadowy killer who calls himself Homo Erectus and who seems determined to wipe gay bashers from the face of the earth. As the killer's body count rises, most citizens are horrified, but a few see him as a hero, and they hire Burke to track him down...and help him escape.
