Book Review: False Fortune

Reviewed By: Harriet Klausner

False Fortune     Amazon US HC Amazon Canada HC
Twist Phelan
Class/Genre:   Mystery   Woman Main Character   Legal Setting
Series: Pinnacle Peak Mysteries # 4
Poisoned Pen, Sep 2007, $24.95

In Arizona attorney Shelby Dain adds her sister lawyer Hannah onto a suit against the Feds. The Tohono O’Odham Native American tribe is suing the government for uranium pollution of Lake Lagunita. Hannah wants to be friends with her older sister so would do just about anything except tell her about a half-sister Anuya they have that she just learned exists.

While feeling they are being followed on the road that circles the lake, Hannah notices a car plunge into the water. She along with Jerry Dan Kovacs rescues the driver. Soon afterward Hannah is actually named lead counsel on the uranium pollution case. Hannah realizes that someone does not want this case going to court and that unknown adversary will kill to insure that never happens. She wonders if perhaps her new friend Jerry Dan who showed up in the nick of time is the culprit or perhaps her half-sister Anuya who suddenly seems to be a target for no apparent reason. As she digs deeper, her doubts grow wider so that even her former boyfriend Cooper Smith, who has acted strang is a suspect as someone wants her off the case in anyway possible,

The latest Pinnacle Peak Mystery (see HEIR APPARENT, FAMILY CLAIMS and SPURRED AMBITION) combines a twisted family entanglement with a fine environmental legal thriller using the Arizona desert as a terrific backdrop to the action. Hannah holds the plot together as she struggles to connect with Shelby after years of estrangement and with Anya whom she just recently learned was her late mother’s other offspring from a different father. Father ties aside, the environmental suit is relevant, complex and as convoluted as is the heroine’s family relationships. Phelan Twist provides a strong Pinnacle Peak entry.

Harriet Klausner

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Harriet Klausner