cover image SEEDS OF DOUBT

SEEDS OF DOUBT

Stephanie Kane, . . Scribner, $24 (304pp) ISBN 978-0-7432-4557-9

A dead six-year-old child named Benjamin Sparks; his troubled aunt, Rachel Boyd, just out of prison after serving 30 years for killing a playmate; a powerful and believably dysfunctional Denver banking family all add up to business as usual for defense attorney Jackie Flowers in Kane's taut and thoughtful third crime novel about the dyslexic lawyer (after Extreme Indifference and Blind Spot ). The best thing about Kane's books is that Jackie's dyslexia is no mere gimmick: the condition colors her life and courtroom work and makes her searches for truth and justice harder and more compelling. When she agrees to take the case of Rachel Boyd, who was looking after Benjamin when he disappeared and was later found murdered, Jackie is reacting strongly to Boyd's past experiences as well as to her own childhood memories. "Give them what they want so they won't see what's really there," Flowers thinks. "Let them think they know the worst, so you can protect what you really want to hide. Was her own transformation a fraud, all the devices that made her successful in court a sham?" Insightful moments like this mark Flowers as more than just another shrewd criminal defense lawyer. Kane deserves to join the ranks of the big-time legal-thriller eagles. Agent, Fred Morris at Jed Mattes Inc. (Nov. 2)