House privilege : Joe DeMarco thrillers #14 / Mike Lawson.

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Title:

House privilege : Joe DeMarco thrillers #14 / Mike Lawson.

Author:

Lawson, Michael, 1948-

ISBN:

9780802148483

Edition:

First Grove Atlantic paperback edition.

Publication Information:

New York : Grove Press, 2021.

Physical Description:

314, 11 p.

Series:

Joe DeMarco Thrillers #14

Abstract:

Fifteen-year-old Cassie Russell, the only daughter of a mega-rich Boston couple, is the sole survivor of a plane crash that killed her parents. She's also the goddaughter of the newly elected Speaker of the House, John Mahoney, and Mahoney becomes her legal guardian. Normally, Mahoney would send his kind-hearted wife to deal with his new ward, but she's unavailable so he dispatches his fixer, Joe DeMarco, to make sure the girl's okay. What should have been a simple assignment unleashes murderous plots involving a devious, deadly lawyer and a Boston mob boss and his Irish thugs. DeMarco ends up chasing the scheming lawyer halfway around the world to save Cassie and ensure that justice is done. And being DeMarco, the legal niceties are mostly ignored.

Subject Term:

DeMarco, Joe (Fictitious character) -- Fiction.

Government investigators -- Fiction.

Embezzlement -- Fiction.

Murder -- Investigation -- Fiction.

Political fiction.

Genre:

Suspense fiction.

Available:*

Library	Material Type	Item Barcode	Shelf Number	Status
Searching... Avon-Washington Township Public Library	Adult Fiction Book Paperback	120791002866712	F LAW	Searching... Unknown

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Summary

In House Privilege , the fourteenth novel in the DeMarco series, Mike Lawson sends his likeable protagonist on a journey that begins in Boston and ends up in a country beyond the reach of the law.

Fifteen-year-old Cassie Russell, the only daughter of a mega-rich Boston couple, is the sole survivor of a plane crash that killed her parents. She's also the goddaughter of the newly elected Speaker of the House, John Mahoney, and after the crash Mahoney becomes her legal guardian. Normally, Mahoney would send his kind-hearted wife to deal with his new ward, but she's unavailable so he dispatches his fixer, Joe DeMarco, to make sure the girl's okay. DeMarco's job is only to put things into a holding pattern until Mrs. Mahoney is able to step in and take charge--but DeMarco unintentionally flips over a rock and out from under it crawls a lawyer, the one managing Cassie's vast estate. DeMarco learns the lawyer has been embezzling from the estate and may have killed Cassie's parents.

What should have been a simple assignment unleashes murderous plots involving a Boston mob boss and his Irish thugs, and things quickly escalate from there. DeMarco ends up chasing the scheming lawyer halfway around the world to save Cassie and ensure that justice is done. And, this being DeMarco, the legal niceties are mostly ignored.

House Privilege is one of the best instalments yet in Edgar Award-nominee Mike Lawson's long-running series.

Reviews (2)

Publisher's Weekly Review

In Lawson's excellent 12th Joe DeMarco thriller (after 2019's House Arrest), Congressman John Fitzpatrick Mahoney, who lost his position as speaker of the House eight years earlier, is poised to take back his former job, but he has a problem. His good friend billionaire Connor Russell has died with his wife in a plane crash, leaving their 15-year-old daughter, Cassie, an orphan. As Mahoney's goddaughter, she's now his legal responsibility. Mahoney sends DeMarco, his personal fixer, to Boston to check on the girl. In Boston, Joe meets with lawyer Erin Kelly, the manager of the Russell trust fund, who suggests that Mahoney transfer his guardianship of Cassie to her. Meanwhile, DeMarco needs to take care of a blackmailer who's squeezing Mahoney. The blackmailer claims he has evidence of an affair Mahoney had 15 years earlier. No surprise, the resourceful Demarco finds ingenious ways to solve all the problems. The author's felicitous style will keep readers smiling throughout. Lawson remains at the top of his game. Agent: David Gernert, Gernert Company. (July)

Booklist Review

ldquo;Smooth operator" is a flexible idiom that can mean a charming person who manipulates others easily with a gracious skill set, or it can mean a clever scoundrel. Joe DeMarco, a fixer for a corrupt congressman, can assume either persona on an ad hoc basis. Armed only with a sprinkled doughnut and a good cup of coffee, he can convince a blackmailer to give it up, and he will not hesitate to deceive or drug dangerous criminals into submission. In this fourteenth entry in the series (after House Arrest, 2019), the action moves out of DC, its customary location, and finds DeMarco in the wintry Northeast after a plane crash leaves a wealthy 15-year-old girl, the goddaughter of the Speaker of the House, as the sole survivor. Dealing with Cassie Russell is truly undiscovered country for DeMarco, as is the remote Adirondack location of the accident, which proves to be sabotage. DeMarco learns that the family lawyer has been embezzling from the Russell trust and is now covering her tracks with the assistance of her crime-boss uncle. As always, justice is done, legalities be damned, and off goes DeMarco for a long-overdue game of golf in sunny Florida. This is a consistently entertaining, well-crafted series. The real mystery here is why Lawson has yet to garner a major award.