In an old Californian house, a young man commits a thoroughly modern crimeMaria Estrada, a hard-partying girl with family ties to some of the toughest gangsters in California, had no idea an old mansion could be so beautiful. The boy who broke into it with her had a feeling she might be impressed. But by the time the night is over, Maria has been brutally killed, and the boy is nowhere to be found. It's up to PI Kate Blanchard and Luke Garrison, a criminal lawyer, to decipher what happened in the grand old mansion. To bring Maria's killer to justice, they must locate the elusive connection between the poverty where she was raised and the affluence of where she died.

A Santa Barbara PI falls in with one of California’s most dangerous families.Two years ago, Kate Blanchard and her partner failed to stop a tragedy. When a man killed his family and then himself, Kate didn’t even fire a shot. Two years later, Kate is divorced, and trying to make it as a private detective. Young, wealthy Laura Sparks hires Kate to look into the suspicious death of her lover, a marijuana smuggler who committed suicide in jail. As Kate gets sucked into the darkness of the Sparks family, she learns that the rich and powerful can be just as dangerous as a madman with a gun.

A public defender must defend the rarest of clients - someone she believes to be innocent.Jessica Thompson is training for a marathon, running fifty miles a week not just to stay in shape, but to help her forget that she spends her days in service to some of California's worst criminals. As a public defender in Los Angeles, this is par for the course. But Roberto Salazar is an unusual client: a kind, mild-mannered man with a clean record who has been accused of trafficking stolen goods. Jessica is happy to get this churchgoing gardener acquitted, but she's shocked when he's accused of murder. Roberto is arrested in connection with three savage murders, each committed on the night of a full moon. Is he innocent? Or did Jessica let a madman go free?

After growing up in a hardscrabble Maryland town, a teenage boy will stop at nothing to pursue his dream.It’s 1957, and fifteen-year-old Roy Poole has again been awakened by the nightly argument between his mother, his sister, and his hard-drinking father. Roy sneaks away after the old man passes out, and hitches a ride to the US Naval Academy in Annapolis, to use its brutal obstacle course, which he can run better than most midshipmen. Whenever he’s navigating the ropes, gullies, and jumps, Roy finds that he’s able to leave his troubles behind. Roy’s dream is to join the Academy as a midshipman, but after years of bad grades and mishaps, Annapolis is a long shot. When a chance encounter with a retired admiral sets him on the path to a better life, Roy will face his greatest obstacle yet.