"Pick it up, but only if you can afford to lose a night's sleep, because you won't be able to put it down." —Steve Martini, author of the Paul Madriani novels Several years have passed since we last saw stunning, savvy attorney Rachel Gold. Now she is a mother, a widow, and a reluctant participant in a lost cause: the Frankenstein Case. She represents a blue-collar neighborhood fighting a developer intent on bulldozing their homes to erect a gated community. Rachel's strategy will be based on the wacky judge on the case, known to the St. Louis Bar as "The Flinch Factor." Then Rachel gains a new client: Susannah, sister of Nick Moran, local heartthrob. Nick has been murdered, found slumped on the front seat of his pickup along an isolated lane known as Gay Way. His female groupies are, to say the least, stunned. His sister smells foul play. A skeptical Rachel agrees to check it out and turns up facts suggesting that Nick's death was not an accident. Are Nick's death and her Frankenstein case somehow related? Can Rachel uncover the truth before more lives are lost?

This book offers a critically informed yet relaxed historical overview of the legal thriller, a unique contribution to crime fiction where most of the titles have been written by professionals such as lawyers and judges. The legal thriller typically uses court trials as the suspense-creating background for presenting legal issues reflecting a wide range of concerns, from corporate conflicts to private concerns, all in a dramatic but highly informed manner. With authors primarily from the USA and the UK, the genre is one which nonetheless enjoys a global reading audience. As well as providing a survey of the legal thriller, this book takes a gender–focused approach to analyzing recently published titles within the field. It also argues for the fascination of the legal thriller both in the way its narrative pattern parallels that of an actual court trial, and by the way it reflects, frequently quite critically, the concerns of contemporary society.

This revised and expanded edition of a proven ministry resource contains new contributions from Leith Anderson, Rick Warren, Brian McLaren, Luis Palau, John Ortberg, Aubrey Malphurs, and many others.