COLD CASE
A Barbara Holloway Legal Thriller
Kate Wilhelm
Mira
August 2008
ISBN 13: 978-0-7783-2528-4
ISBN 10 : 0-7783-2528-8
Mystery

Barbara Holloway's client is controversial scholar David Etheridge who stands accused of murdering state senator Robert McCrutchen--whose home he was staying in while lecturing in Eugene, Oregon. Etheridge and McCrutchen were college adversaries and supposed rivals for the affections of Jill Storey, a young woman whose unsolved murder has been on the books for twenty-two years. The police now set their sights on David Etheridge as their suspect since both men had publicly quarreled over Jill the night of her murder and it had been revealed that McCrutchen had paid the impoverished student for sex. Just who was Jill Storey and how was she connected to David Etheridge and the McCrutheon family? Then David's brutally assaulted after a lecture--are the two murders and the assault connected? It's up to Barbara and her team to find the answers to clear her brilliant but irascible client before it's too late...

COLD CASE is a compelling entry in Kate Wilhelm's well-written Barbara Holloway legal thriller series. COLD CASE is a page-turner as Barbara and her associates dig deep in the past and the present to come up with a plausible alternative theory and the evidence to support it to ferret out the real murderer...and it's always enjoyable checking in with the series regulars and seeing what's new in their personal lives. If you enjoy food in your mysteries, COLD CASE has a lot of it and most of it's cooked by Barbara's father Frank--yum! COLD CASE is the eleventh entry in the Barbara Holloway series and recommended for the mystery and legal thriller fan.

Reviewed by Debora Hosey
Rating: 4