cover image Paradox

Paradox

Catherine Coulter. Gallery, $27.99 (448p) ISBN 978-1-5011-3812-6

At the start of bestseller Coulter’s pulse-pounding 22nd FBI thriller (after 2017’s Enigma), a beeping security monitor wakes up married FBI agents Lacey Sherlock and Dillon Savich late one night in their Washington, D.C., home. Sherlock grabs a gun and goes to check on their young son, Sean. In the boy’s bedroom, she confronts an armed intruder, who jumps out a window and flees after a tense standoff. Savich and Sherlock fear that the intruder will be back to try to do Sean harm. Two days later, in Willicott, Md., police chief Ty Christie observes two figures in a rowboat on Lake Massey as one of them hits the other over the head with an oar. The attacker tosses the body overboard. Since the victim, later identified as Octavia Ryan, was a federal prosecutor, the FBI take over the investigation. Expert sleuths Savich and Sherlock, with help from their computer MAX, find strong evidence that Octavia’s killer and Sean’s potential assailant are the same person. Coulter fans will have a tough time putting this one down. Agent: Robert Gottlieb, Trident Media Group. (July)