| Title | : | Presumption of Death (Nina Reilly, #9) |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0440240875 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780440240877 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Mass Market Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 480 |
| Publication | : | First published January 1, 2003 |
Nina Reilly needs a fresh start. In three years, she’s taken on some of Lake Tahoe’s most controversial cases and has turned her struggling one-woman law firm into a thriving practice. Now she’s ready to sort out her complex relationship with her boyfriend, Monterey P.I. Paul van Wagoner. So she’s heading to the Carmel Valley, the place where she began her career and where her estranged father lives. It’s also a place of dramatic contradictions and hidden tensions, of new wealth and old families. And, within days of her arrival, Nina is already feeling the heat, as a case of arson exposes some of the darkest secrets of her hometown.
Two suspicious fires have already raged through the valley this summer, igniting suspicions of arson. When a third blaze ends in a fatality, police zero in on a suspect: Wish, the son of Sandy Whitefeather, Nina’s ex-assistant. The dead man is identified as Wish’s childhood friend, a troubled local auto mechanic who hated the changes wealthy newcomers had brought to the valley. Nina and Paul are certain that there is more to this strange case than meets the eye. As they work together to clear Wish, new, more frightening questions are raised, and another fire is set. And out of the flames a terrifying picture emerges: a community steeped in secrets and rage, a tangled history between two men, and a killer whose motives are dark and wrenching.
With the relentless page-turning suspense that has become her trademark, Perri O’Shaughnessy once again demonstrates her talent to enthrall. A haunting tale of crime and punishment, old grudges and second chances, Presumption of Death is suspense fiction at its finest--instantly compelling and utterly impossible to put down.
From the Hardcover edition.
Presumption of Death (Nina Reilly, #9) Reviews
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3.5 stars- I enjoyed this story in this series of Nina Reilly. I don't recall reading any other before this one. This is one gutsy attorney and she fights for what she thinks is right. In this story, she must find out who is setting the fires that are delaying the new development from being built. Who is behind the fires? Danny, the young man that is working with Paul is the son of a good friend of Ninas'. He is pulled into the arson mystery and Nina must do her best to clear him before any more fires are started or other people get hurt. Can a group of people hold the key to this mystery?
To top things off, Ninas son returns to the USA after his European vacation, and ends up in the small apartment Nina and Paul are sharing. How will she help her friends son? Will Paul and her unravel the mystery before its too late? What will happen to her relationship with Paul. Only one way to find out, read the book. -
It Sucked, she should never have moved from Tahoe
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I've always found this series to be interesting, highly detailed, suspenseful, and informative as to the regions of Lake Tahoe and Carmel. Since I've been to both places several times, it's fun to be able to actually picture some of the areas. This book was no different in those respects and I like the main characters and their development (Nina, Paul, Bob, Sandy). It's well worth reading and I will definitely continue with the series. This particular book had a few disappointments to it, however. The new characters (people on Siesta Court)were not fully developed and I never felt like I got to know any of them. Sometimes, there is a bit too much legal detail. The story moved more slowly than those of the Nina Reilly series usually do. And, finally, for a book of over 400 pages with lots of detail, the ending wrapped up too quickly as though it was an afterthought and not well plotted like the rest of the book. I don't mean these comments to be serious criticisms of this book, overall I love the series.
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I know I've read previous escapades of Nina, the attorney, written by two sisters. I remember them as OK enough to pick this up from the swap table at the gym. This one takes place in the Carmel Valley with the Grand Finale near Lake Tahoe, Nina's original home base.
The book deals with arson and does a good job of keeping a whole bunch of neighbors on one street straight. An unexpected, but logical ending. An easy read. -
I have read all the Nina Reilly books in order, and this is the worst. It does not follow the usual formula, which is investigating complex crimes, tracking down suspects, unraveling clues, going through myriad twists and turns and finally solving the mystery. This book is a soap opera - long narratives of the suspects (there are about a dozen of them), their marital and family problems, their motivations, and their phoney lives. The actual crime, arson, is just a backdrop.
Nina has had a difficult personal life: having a love affair with a transient Swede and becoming an unwed mother, marrying and divorcing a man who was not the father of her child, marrying and becoming widowed (covered in the book ACTS OF MALICE), and now trying to make a success of it with her investigator, Paul, even though she does not really love him.
Be wary of the title - it implies that there is something not quite right with the murder victim. You should all be aware that a positive ID (via DNA, dental records, or finger prints) is usually required before you presume the identity of someone. If the author does not provide such an ID, be wary. In this case Wish repeatedly tries to tell Nina that something is wrong with the ID of the victim, but she does not listen, so she is thrown off course, which is frustrating to the reader. -
Nina Reilly needs a fresh start. In three years, she’s taken on some of Lake Tahoe’s most controversial cases and has turned her struggling one-woman law firm into a thriving practice. Now she’s ready to sort out her complex relationship with her boyfriend, Monterey P.I. Paul van Wagoner. So she’s heading to the Carmel Valley, the place where she began her career and where her estranged father lives. It’s also a place of dramatic contradictions and hidden tensions, of new wealth and old families. And, within days of her arrival, Nina is already feeling the heat, as a case of arson exposes some of the darkest secrets of her hometown.
Two suspicious fires have already raged through the valley this summer, igniting suspicions of arson. When a third blaze ends in a fatality, police zero in on a suspect: Wish, the son of Sandy Whitefeather, Nina’s ex-assistant. The dead man is identified as Wish’s childhood friend, a troubled local auto mechanic who hated the changes wealthy newcomers had brought to the valley. Nina and Paul are certain that there is more to this strange case than meets the eye. As they work together to clear Wish, new, more frightening questions are raised, and another fire is set. And out of the flames a terrifying picture emerges: a community steeped in secrets and rage, a tangled history between two men, and a killer whose motives are dark and wrenching. -
Reading this author is comfort food. I've read a few of her books so I do know the characters. Nina Reilly is a smart, good-looking attorney who wants a social life and moves from her Lake Tahoe abode to Carmel Valley. She takes up residence and office space with Paul van Wagoner, a handsome private detective and Nina's love interest. Just as Nina is getting comfortable with her relationship Paul’s assistant is arrested for arson and homicide by setting fires to a development with is friend.
The books is an easy and fast read and the story isn’t hard to follow. I can honestly say that I didn’t see this type of ending coming. All works out. -
This is the ninth book in the Nina Reilly series (2003) and I loved it. Set in Monterey County, CA it is a classic Perri O’Shaughnessy crime drama set against the backdrop of the current reality of California wildfires and full of very interesting characters. Keeping them all straight was a bit of a challenge but it keeps the reader on their toes. Well-written, exciting and not predictable. Great story line. Dramatic tension, at its best. There are four more novels in this series and I can’t wait to read the next one (“Unlucky in Law”).
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In this book, Nina and Paul are trying to live together in Paul's Carmel Valley condo. Bob is in Sweden with his father. Sandy is in DC working with the BIA; her son, Wish, is interning with Paul while taking summer classes.
Someone is building fires in the woods in the mountains. Wish gets burned, and charged with setting the fires.
Nina and Paul work on getting Wish out of jail.
They find the real fire-starter. -
A good legal thriller. Nina Reilly takes on Wish's case, to prove his innocence. In doing so, she gets wrapped up in a small community at the heart of a series of fires set by an arsonist. With this series, I always get a little frustrated that Nina isn't as independent as I'd like her to - but in this book, she stands on her own fairly well. I also like the subplot of her and Paul, and how they deal with Nina's son, Bob.
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Entertaining story; I'm a fan of the series although I haven't read one for a while. Could have given it 4 stars but I absolutely hate the relationship between Nina and Paul. Can't she see he's controlling and an emotional abuser???
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When I bought this book(so long ago) I was a huge fan of this series. Now picking it up, I don't remember why I liked the series so much. The Paul and Nina couple just doesn't work. I have one more DTB to read in this series and if that one doesn't convince me to keep reading I will be done.
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Since this book is part of a series reading the others first might have been helpful.
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I got to start getting more of her books.. was surprised at the end..
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Nina has left Reno and moved in with her boyfriend Paul and gets caught up into an investigation into arson fires.
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A bit too much of the lawyer talk for me.
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Presumption of Death, by Perri O'Shaughnessy (Dell, 2003) is a combination detective-lawyer mystery. Nina Reilly is a smart, good-looking attorney who wants a social life and moves from her Lake Tahoe abode to Carmel Valley. She takes up residence and office space with Paul van Wagoner, a handsome private detective and Nina's love interest. Just as things between them are settling into a pleasant pattern, Paul's assistant is arrested on arson and homicide charges. The police believe he is behind three wildfires that not only scorched some of CA's scenery and a housing development, but also covered up a murder. Thus wrested out of her self-imposed sabbatical, Nina dons her lawyer outfit and trots off to the jail and courthouse to rescue Wish, the accused. Paul sets out to find the facts to support his conviction that Wish is innocent. As they struggle to work as a team, Nina tries to keep Paul from breaking and entering and Wish's mother shows up. The plot thickens.
The subsequent tramping across burned hillsides, through neighborhood homes, and into a hostile judge's courtroom set the stage for a mystery that weaves together Native American issues, environmental degradation, urban sprawl, and the plight of the homeless. The story features a string of odd but somehow ordinary folks, some of whose attempts to protect their investments cross the line into criminal conspiracy.
The book is an easy read, moves right along, and entertains. It is not among the outstanding mysteries that I've read but it is well suited to frequently interrupted reading sessions, as the plot is pretty straight forward and not difficult to recall. Perri O'Shaughnessy, by the way, is a pen name for two sisters who combine their backgrounds in writing and law and their familiarity with the Lake Tahoe area to present believable settings and legal processes. -
Where I normally am enthusiastic about the Perri O'Shaughnessy team of writers, the dialogue seemed a bit stiff and the descriptions placed to show that there had been some fact-checking going on.
The story itself stands up well with the situation of arson in a new development of a wilderness area.
