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Northern New Jersey has a new local hero on its cultural crime turf.

He’s Andy Carpenter, the Paterson defense attorney who can sling a quip as fast as he can outmaneuver a snarling prosecutor. Acclaimed author David Rosenfelt’s first novel, was nominated for an Edgar Award, now in this new novel, the intrepid lawyer is thrust into the spotlight where he risks becoming a media victim…of the most fatal kind. His streak of murder case acquittals made him a regular on cable talk shows. His recent $22 million inheritance bought him a dog rescue operation named the Tara Foundation after his own beloved golden retriever. Yet after turning down cases left and right, Andy Carpenter thinks he’s facing a midlife crisis.

When a friend, a newspaper owner, calls in a favor and asks him to protect his star reporter, Andy is less than thrilled. His new client is Daniel Cummings, a journalist who is being used as a mouthpiece by a brutal serial killer. Things only get worse when Daniel is discovered near the body of the murderer’s latest victim. And after Andy himself starts collecting anonymous death threats, he hears the news every defense lawyer dreads…and moves to within a dangerous keystroke of becoming tomorrow’s obituary.

My favorite addiction right now is Andy Carpenter novels–lots of dry humor and wit, complex enough to make me thing but not so bogged down in legalese that it’s boring, and not a lot of gratuitous content (there’s always a few swear words, sometimes f-bombs, but a only a couple). This wasn’t my favorite of the stories I’ve read thus far; for some reason it felt a bit anti-climactic at points and this cast of characters felt a little less joined together as other books.

Still, it was enjoyable and easy to read (I finished the audiobook in a day). I loved seeing more of Andy’s early life and how he and all of the characters first got together (including the start of his animal shelter). One of the things I love about this series is that it’s technically a mystery series, but it has the feel of a cozy mystery.

Rated PG-13 for swearing and murder.

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For more Andy Carpenter mysteries, check out:

Open and Shut by David Rosenfelt