House Justice: A Joe DeMarco Thriller

After the head of the CIA, Jake LaFountaine, gives a secret briefing to a group of congressional leaders in Lawson’s engaging fifth thriller featuring fix-it man Joe DeMarco (after House Secrets), someone leaks the information to the press. This slip results in the brutal killing of CIA agent Mahata Javadi (“one of the bravest persons I ever met,” LaFountaine tells a room full of reporters), who was working undercover in Iran. John Fitzpatrick Mahoney, Speaker of the House of Representatives and Washington’s premier political puppet master, tasks DeMarco with finding the leaker. Despite three wild cards confounding the search—a Russian mobster, the wealthy head of a technology company, and a mysterious killer bent on revenge—DeMarco manages to remain alive and get himself a fabulous new girlfriend. The always present push and pull between the political machinations of alcoholic, egotistical Mahoney and De Marco’s basic decency raises the ethical stakes. (July)