This authoring team brings their readers back to the Hamptons to the one used in Beach House. This time readers are brought into a John Grisham-like tale that centers around the murder of three young men. It quickly becomes clear that they were gunned down after the conclusion of a game of pick-up basketball, which seemed to have some difficult racial undertones.

Dante Halleyvelle, an African American who has been highlighted as possibly being one of the first choices in the next NBA draft session, is quickly charged with the murders even though no one believes he could have been the person to do it. A lawyer not-unlike Johnnie Cochrane, who worked on a case not-unlike O.J. Simpson rushes in to defend Dante, but Dante opts to go with a more low-key set of lawyers in order to avoid the image that he is guilty, which is how everyone vies the not-unlike O.J. Simpson character.

Instead, he hires Kate Costello, a small time lawyer with a strong recoard and her love from the past, Tom Dunleavy. Tom is a former pro-NBA player who faded into obscurity after a bad injury ended his career just as it was getting started.

Readers join the tale, which is presented from the joint persepectives of Dante and his lawyers, as the case progresses to trial and the true murderer is revealed. The real murderer is not terribly surprising, but that person also does not seem to have much a of a motive, which sorta ruined a book in which I was already really struggling to connect with. The characters seem almost flat and seem to be secondary as the plot races to a conclusion.

I have to say this is my least favorite book by Patterson. It is worth skipping.