so you can't have a murder mystery without at least one death, but it's nice to read a mystery that is intelligent, enjoyable, has realistic characters, and takes place in my neighborhood. the only problem i had with it was that i ended up reading it in one sitting and now i have to find another one.

Although I have read -- and enjoyed -- virtually every book in every series by the most famous female mystery writers, Carolyn Wheat unequivocally remains my favorite.

This series is about a Legal Aid attorney named Cass Jameson. As such, it introduces fascinating glimpses into seldom-seen areas of the legal system -- along with providing excellent mysteries. This is one series I buy in hardcover as soon as each book is published.

The books are all very well-written, fast-moving, and entertaining. I cannot sufficiently recommend them. IMHO, this is the best mystery series available.

Although I have read -- and enjoyed -- virtually every book in every series by the most famous female mystery writers, Carolyn Wheat unequivocally remains my favorite.

This series is about a Legal Aid attorney named Cass Jameson. As such, it introduces fascinating glimpses into seldom-seen areas of the legal system -- along with providing excellent mysteries.

The books are all very well-written, fast-moving, and entertaining. I cannot sufficiently recommend them. IMHO, this is the best mystery series available.

Although I have read -- and enjoyed -- virtually every book in every series by the most famous female mystery writers, Carolyn Wheat unequivocally remains my favorite.

This series is about a Legal Aid attorney named Cass Jameson. As such, it introduces fascinating glimpses into seldom-seen areas of the legal system -- along with providing excellent mysteries.

The books are all very well-written, fast-moving, and entertaining. I cannot sufficiently recommend them. IMHO, this is the best mystery series available.

How To Write Killer Fiction: The Funhouse Of Mystery & The Roller Coaster Of Suspense by award-winning mystery writer, editor, and anthologist Carolyn Wheat is a superbly presented, 192-page, "how-to" instructional reference work about the art of creating masterful and enjoyable novels of mystery and suspense. Individual chapters address style and structure, creating satisfying endings, the logistics of creating a story arc, and more. An excellent primer by a published author who has earned the Anthony, Agatha, Macavity, and Shamus Awards, How To Write Killer Fiction is a "must" for anyone aspiring to work in this demanding and popular genre.

At the Appellate level, Brooklyn attorney Cass Jamison proves that her client Keith Jernigan could not have committed the robbery that he was previously convicted of, thus obtaining freedom for the innocent man. Subsequently, Cass gets embroiled in a divorce case when her tenant Nellis Cartwright wants her previous settlement with her former spouse, Grant Eddongton, re-negotiated because she insists her attorney, a friend of Cass, botched up the case.

Keith reappears in Cass' life when the son of her secretary is arrested after forming a friendship with the man. Cass suspects that Keith had something to do with the arrest and begins to investigate the man. She learns that though he was framed for the robbery count that she got him acquitted on, he threw acid into the face of a former girlfriend. When Nellis is shot in her office, Cass thinks that she might have been the intended target and wonders if she is again going to on guard until she gets some answers.

SWORN TO DEFEND is a great 250 page mystery novel that fans will swear is one of the best fictions pieces of the year due to an intriguing twist on the story line in which the client is innocent of the charges, but culpable for a more devastating crime. However, the final few pages seem as if Carolyn Wheat needed an upbeat-like ending for a climax, which thankfully fails to take away from a greatand fast-paced tour of Brooklyn that will keep readers on the edge of their seats. Fans of urban legal procedurals need to read this novel and Cass' previous two stories (DEAD MAN'S THOUGHTS and MEAN STREAK) for some of the best the crime genre has to offer.

Harriet Klausner

This is an absolutely dreadful book: completely disorganized, with not much of a story to it, and an ending that doesn't make sense.

Although I have read -- and enjoyed -- virtually every book in every series by the most famous female mystery writers, Carolyn Wheat unequivocally remains my favorite.

This series is about a Legal Aid attorney named Cass Jameson. As such, it introduces fascinating glimpses into seldom-seen areas of the legal system -- along with providing excellent mysteries. This is one series I buy in hardcover as soon as each book is published.

The books are all very well-written, fast-moving, and entertaining. I cannot sufficiently recommend them. IMHO, this is the best mystery series available.

I eagerly await each of Carolyn Wheat's mysteries. Troubled Waters is an excellent, well plotted mystery. The character development is strong and the story line demands the reader's full attention.

I have read each of her previous Cass Jameson mysteries and thoroughly enjoyed each of them. This one reaches new heights of excellence with its amazingly plotted and executed story line.

My one suggestion to the author is that she utilize a medical advisor to check medical procedures and equipment. One can not speak while on a respirator and when visiting a patient in ICU with a head injury there would be no need to gown. Other than those minor errors, I thought this book was her best yet. I eagerly await the next offering in this wonderful series.

Kind of a nifty idea at work here, an anthology of sixteen murder stories set along America's most famous--and mythologized--road. To further the conceit, all the authors lived in towns along the road at one point in their lives, and thus presumably bring a little more of themselves to the stories. Of course most of the stories are set in the past, prior to the pervasiveness of the modern interstate system, and tend to fetishize various old cars.

As with most anthologies, the quality is fairly variable, and favorites are highly dependent on personal tastes. I found "Rappin' Dog," by Dick Lochte to be the best of the lot, featuring a smart and precocious adolescent girl detective-in-training. A close second is Barbara D'Amato's predictable, but still highly effective, "Motel 66." Les Roberts' post-WWII tale, "Willing To Work" is a deftly nasty story, although the murder's undoing is a bit too obvious to make the reversal totally satisfying. Carolyn Hart's WWII-era story about a couple of nosy kids and some black-marketeers is kind of neat in a strictly period piece way. David August's "Blind Corner" is yet another period story featuring a nosy kid who thwarts the bad guy. David August's Vietnam-era set story takes a basic noir story of adultery, murder, and double-crossing and situates it so that it fits the anthology. Doris Merideth's "Incident on 6th Street" features a cliché crotchety old woman narrator whose Depression-era story is somewhat undone by her annoying delivery.

As for the rest, Judith Van Cieson's "Dead Man's Curve" plods along rather boringly to a kind of tame payoff, while J.A. Jance, Eleanor Taylor Bland, Lillian Roberts, Michael Allen Dymmoch, Gary Phillips, Earlene Fowler, John Lutz, and editor Wheat all deliver fairly unmemorable stories. Your mileage may vary.

Overall these stories were great. The ones that really stuck to route 66 were the best. A couple just mentioned the road. I doubt these short stories gave justice to some of the authors. J.A. Jance is a much better writer than this book shows. Most of the stories have twists at the end. It was fun to guess the ending, but I was wrong about 1/2 the time.

A generation of Americans is just beginning to learn about "the Mother Road," U.S. Route 66, that cruised from Chicago through to Los Angeles.

The premise of this anthology is along that stretch of highway, murder and mayhem once lurked.

Sixteen writers ply their trade with varying levels of success. And though none of the stories are stinkers, three really stand out:

"Rappin' Dog" by Dick Lochte pits a precocious 14-year-old girl/would-be detective against her elders in a mystery plot right out of MTV. When one of a rapper's hangers-on tells her "I take you to be some kind of Spice Girl wannabe," Serendipity (Sarah to her friends) coolly replies "Then you'd be making a mistake." She also catches the errors the police and her detective friend makes.

"Motel 66" by Barbara D'Amato is a classic tale of domestic discord with a smoothly twisted ending that *I* didn't see coming.

Reading "Spooked" by Carolyn G. Hart is like finding a fine old pulp magazine -- Black Mask or something similar -- tucked away in your father's chest. A neat little World War II story, and Hart manages to work in a recipe for apple pie which uses honey instead of the then-rationed sugar.

All told, a nostalgic trip down memory lane on a highway that itself is fast-becoming a memory. Recommended!

I started reading at the beach and had to stay until I finished it! I haven't found the other Cass Jamison books but I am going to look harder. Plot is built around the surogate mother business.

Although somewhat slow to really grab me by the throat and not let go, Carolyn Wheat's second Cass Jamison mystery novel finally caught my interest and never gave up. Cass, a late-30-ish NY attorney, is roped into representing a birth mother in a private adoption spearheaded by her old law school roommate. What seems simple, of course, is not. Cass finds the uncomplicated legal aspects of adoption are not the problem; the birth mother's unusual behavior and eventual murder make it far more complex than she ever dreamed. As an adoptive parent (through an agency) and the husband of 40-something lady lawyer with a family law practice, this book opened my eyes to the dangers, thrills, and heartache of adoption when improperly done. The plot is deftly drawn, with a logical but surprising conclusion. Heartily recommended--even if you don't have a particular interest in adoption.

Although I have read -- and enjoyed -- virtually every book in every series by the most famous female mystery writers, Carolyn Wheat unequivocally remains my favorite.

This series is about a Legal Aid attorney named Cass Jameson. As such, it introduces fascinating glimpses into seldom-seen areas of the legal system -- along with providing excellent mysteries. This is one series I buy in hardcover as soon as each book is published.

The books are all very well-written, fast-moving, and entertaining. I cannot sufficiently recommend them. IMHO, this is the best mystery series available.

The title refers to the thrilling roller coaster the protagonist enjoyed after initial reluctance. "Mean Streak" had little of the thrills of a roller coaster and more of the plodding of a old steam engine.

The references to the wild new legal territory for the attorney were too great in number to be justified. Characters were introduced with little coloring to match their supposed epic status. Some of the courtroom passages were intriguing, but I found it hard to visualize much of the other narratives. Maybe that's my own weakness, but I think some editing could have made for a more direct, hard-hitting novel.

Carolyn Wheat tells a mean and believable story of a lawyer tangled in his own deceitful web. When mob lawyer Matt Riordan seeks the help of his ex-lover, Cass Jameson, he may be asking for more trouble than he is ready to deal with. Because Cass is street-tough and honest--an unbeatable combination in a regular courtroom, but how about in Federal Court? Cass faces a prejudiced judge (against her client BEFORE his day in court), a conniving prosecutor and an assistant who scores big on her back. How Cass solves the mystery of mob deaths and obtains justice for her client make a good read and a classic mystery. Parts of the book are slow, but hard to put down because you want all the loose ends knotted before you stop reading. If you enjoy Grisham, you will love Carolyn Wheat--she is Grisham with a bite!

Although I have read -- and enjoyed -- virtually every book in every series by the most famous female mystery writers, Carolyn Wheat unequivocally remains my favorite.

This series is about a Legal Aid attorney named Cass Jameson. As such, it introduces fascinating glimpses into seldom-seen areas of the legal system -- along with providing excellent mysteries. This is one series I buy in hardcover as soon as each book is published.

The books are all very well-written, fast-moving, and entertaining. I cannot sufficiently recommend them. IMHO, this is the best mystery series available.

All 13 stories feature women protagonists - be they lawyers or judges, & 11 are written by women. For most of this genre's history (even until the 50s) women lawyers were sidelined by their male counterparts, & "thought unfitted for trial work and suited only for matrimonial cases or backroom fields as estates and trusts" (Time Magazine, 1964 - quoted in the Introduction by Linda Fairstein.)

Same was the scenario in the legal thriller world. Save for a Sara Woods or a Sarah Caudwell, the presence of women writers in the genre was almost nil & there were none to challenge the supremacy of authors like Erle Stanley Gardner, Auchincloss or George Higgins. However, since the 90s when Grisham, Turow, Martini & Richard North Patterson began to rule the genre, there has also been a strong & effective representation by women authors like Lisa Scottoline, O'Shaughnessy, Lisa Mason, Lia Matera & many others who have carved their own niche.

Women Before the Bench is proof of the success these authors have achieved. Perri O'Shaughnessy's Juggernaut features her series protagonist, Nina Reilly who investigates a supposed car accident, & Michael A. Kahn's amusing Strange Bedfellows are the highlights of the first part titled The Civil Wars.

Rochelle Krich's Yow Win Some is the better of the two stories featured in the second part titled The Prosecutors, & is a good story centered on a drunk driving case. British author Sarah Caudwell's The Triumph of Eve & Margaret Maron's Mixed Blessings are the other better stories in the collection.

So how did I find the collection? For one thing, it offers variety & includes stories on civil law, family law as well as criminal law, & in that sense it is an anthology worth its name.

The Editor has done a great job in selecting stories told from different viewpoints, that of the Prosecutor, the Defender & the Judge. I had one major regret, however, no story from Lisa Scottoline, aka "the female Grisham" - the most popular of woman legal authors, & in that respect, this anthology is incomplete.

All in all, Women Before the Bench is proof of the success the women legalists have achieved, but it cannot be called a "testament" of their success.

A great collection of legal tales by fine writers of the genre. I enjoyed each story and recommend this as a nice book to curl up for some delicious mysteries!

From R. Barri Flowers, the author of the legal thrillers, DAMNING EVIDENCE, POSITIVE I.D., and JUSTICE SERVED.

This collection of thirteen short stories centers on female attorneys as the stars of each tale working a wide variety of cases in diverse settings that run the sub-genre's gamut. The authors are a who's who of the legal procedural sub-genre and though mostly female, not totally. Each contributor insured that the tale was top quality (or perhaps the editor separated the chaff from the wheat) and fun to read regardless of the gender of the audience. Some of the lead characters are so good, readers will hope to see them reappear in a full-length novel. WOMEN BEFORE THE BENCH shows we've come a long way in the law and literature.

Harriet Klausner