From the author of STILL LIFE comes the second novel featuring the irresistible Chief Inspector Gamache...The falling snow brings a hush to Three Pines -- until a scream pierces the air. A spectator at the annual Boxing Day curling match has been fatally electrocuted. Heading the investigation, Chief Inspector Armand Gamache unravels the dead woman's past and discovers a history of secrets and enemies. But Gamache has enemies of his own. As a bitter wind blows into the village, something even more chilling is sneaking up behind him!
Sara Linton, medical examiner in the small town of Heartsdale, is called out to an apparent suicide on the local college campus. The mutilated body provides little in the way of clues - and the college authorities are keen to avoid a scandal - but for Sara and police chief Jeffrey Tolliver, things don't add up. Two more suspicious suicides follow, and a young woman is brutally attacked.
Anita Margolis had vanished. There was no body, no crime - nothing more concrete than an anonymous letter and the intriguing name of Smith. According to headquarters, it wasn't to be considered a murder enquiry at all. Chief Inspector Wexford, however, had other ideas.
Mason "Mace" Perry was a firebrand cop on the D.C. police force until she was kidnapped and framed for a crime. She lost everything-her badge, her career, her freedom-and spent two years in prison. Now she's back on the outside and focused on one mission: to be a cop once more. Her only shot to be a true blue again is to solve a major case on her own, and prove she has the right to wear the uniform. But even with her police chief sister on her side, she has to work in the shadows: A vindictive U.S. attorney is looking for any reason to send Mace back behind bars. Then Roy Kingman enters her life.
Lescroart regulars Dismas Hardy and Abe Glitsky may have survived a deadly shootout in The First Law (2003), but their psyches are on life support. Hardy drinks too much and cuts deals instead of practicing law. Glitsky's still a hardworking "procedure freak," but his guts are killing him, and he struggles in his new hands-off role as San Francisco's deputy chief of investigations. Amy Wu, an up-and-comer in Hardy's law firm, isn't doing well, either; grieving her father's death, she's looking for love in singles bars and spinning out of control.
