House Witness: A Joe DeMarco Thriller

At the start of Lawson’s winning 12th Joe DeMarco thriller (after 2016’s House Revenge), John Mahoney, the minority leader of the House of Representatives, learns that his son has been killed. Still worse, his wife, Mary Pat, doesn’t know he had one. Dominic, who’s the result of Mahoney’s affair many years before with Connie DiNunzio, an aide to a New York congressman, has been killed in a New York City bar by Toby Rosenthal, a rich man’s son who is probably going to try to buy his way out of a conviction. Connie wants vengeance. Mahoney assigns DeMarco, his fixer, the job of making sure Toby goes to jail. Each of the five eyewitnesses to the shooting can identify Toby as the killer, and each becomes the target of a con woman, Ella Fields, whose specialty is witness tampering. Readers will enjoy watching the case unravel and how DeMarco goes about making things right. The action builds to a satisfying resolution, but an open ending promises more troubles for DeMarco down the line. Agent: David Gernert, Gernert Company. (Feb.)