Stuart Woods

In Hollywood, if you rock the boat, you'd better know how to swim. That's what New York lawyer-turned-investigator Stone Barrington learns the hard way when he goes to Los Angeles in search of an old flame who's disappeared on her new husband. Before it's over, Barrington will take on big-time mobsters, big-screen directors, and a big anchor.

Lawyer Stone Barrington of New York investigates a series of murders, apparently committed by a convict in a campaign of vengeance against people who put him away. Complicating the probe is that one of the murders was committed in Barrington's apartment and he is under suspicion.

Murder is not a spectator sport.Chuck Chandler has choked on more than one occasion--first as a pro tennis player at Wimbledon, then as a womanizing coach at posh tennis clubs around the country. Now at Key West's Old Racquet Club, Chuck gets involved with the wrong married woman--the enticing Clare Carras, married to an enigmatic older man--and soon he is in way over his head.Enter Tommy Sculley, a retired New York homicide detective who has just...

Feared and loathed for her poison pen and ice queen persona, Amanda Dart has made her share of enemies. Then the tables are turned. An anonymous gossipmonger is faxing Amanda's personal and private peccadilloes to anyone who can read. Desperate to save her reputation, she enlists the help of New York lawyer and private investigator Stone Barrington to learn the identity of the faxer. And everyone in the world of tabloid journalism becomes a suspect....

Everyone is always telling Stone Barrington he's too smart to be a cop, but it's pure luck that places him on the streets in the dead of night, just in time to witness the horrifying incident that turns his life inside out. He is suddenly on the front page of every New York newspaper, and his life is hopelessly entwined in the increasingly shocking life (and perhaps death) of Sasha Nijinsky, the country's hottest and most beautiful television anchorwoman....