DEAD WINNER

In this novel, an unassuming lawyer tries to help a client he’s in love with and gets pulled into a criminal conspiracy.

Rory McEntyre is a successful attorney but has always been envious of his old friend from prep school Tom Williams, a handsome “superstar money manager” with a beautiful wife named Monica. Apparently, there are no limits to Tom’s luck—he buys a lottery ticket, wins $60 million, and asks Rory to oversee the establishment of a trust for its management. But shortly after, Rory receives a panicked phone call from Monica with shocking news: Tom died by turning a gun on himself. Besides the inexplicability of Tom’s act, Rory encounters further peculiarities. Tom’s lottery ticket has disappeared, and he seems to have transferred the majority of his money to an offshore bank account, leaving Monica all but destitute. Rory digs deeper, assuming the role of Monica’s lawyer and “knight in shining armor”—and discovers that Tom was involved in some sort of fraud while working for Northrup Investments. In order to cover his tracks, the head of the company, Jack Northrup, dispatches his henchman to silence Monica. This is an entangled and delightfully unpredictable tale—Chapman has constructed a suspenseful story that will deeply draw readers in. Unfortunately, the author’s writing style sometimes lacks luster—consider Monica’s confession of her feelings to Rory: “You think Tom was every girl’s dream. He was confident and handsome and smart, and rich, of course. But you were sweet and kind. You cared about other people. You wanted to change the world. I always wondered what it would have been like with you.” But despite the uneven prose, this novel offers an entertaining and gripping crime drama.

A surprising and tantalizing murder mystery.