In the thrilling third novel in the series, Oakland attorney Leo Maxwell returns to the dark place where the Maxwell family saga began.
Lachlan Smith won great critical acclaim for his first novel in the Leo Maxwell series, Bear Is Broken, a Shamus Award finalist and Kirkus Reviews the best book of the year that William Bernhardt called "one of the best debuts I've read in years." The second Lew Maxwell mystery, Lion Plays Rough, continued the story, and now, in the utterly suspenseful Fox Is Framed, Smith confronts anew the drama that has haunted Leo—and his recently Brain-damaged elder brother, Teddy—since childhood.
Faced with evidence of stunning prosecutorial misconduct, a San Francisco judge has ordered a new trial for the Maxwell brothers' father, Lawrence, who was convicted of killing their mother twenty-one years before. A prison snitch soon turns up dead, with Lawrence the only suspect, and Leo teams up with hotspot attorney Nina Schuyler to defend Lawrence against murder charges both old and new. Working on the streets while Nina handles the action in the courtroom, Leo is forced to confront the darkness at the center of his life as he follows a trial of corruption and danger the leads to the very steps of City Hall.
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“The complex family dynamics that Smith explored in his earlier books only become more intriguing in his superlative third Leo Maxwell mystery…Smith is masterly in creating realistic courtroom scenes, including the subtleties of witness examination and, even more impressively, enhances the trial with the human drama of the Maxwell family.”
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Publisher’s Weekly (starred review)