LASSITER by Paul Levine

After a fourteen-year hiatus—during which he wrote for TV's JAG and penned the successful Solomon vs. Lord series of romantic comedy legal thrillers—Levine returns to Miami Dolphins linebacker-turned-tenacious defense attorney Jake Lassiter.

In Lassiter, on sale September 13, Ohio insurance investigator Amy Larkin approaches Jake, believing he was the last person to see her sister Krista before her disappearance eighteen years earlier. Jake is reluctant to tell Amy the whole truth, regretting the night he spent with Krista and what he hadn't done for her the next morning.

Lassiter is full of people keeping secrets from each other. As many secrets as he reveals, Levine keeps enough in store for a great ending. When a writer returns to a series character after such a hiatus, I look for signs of age or the writer working his way back into the character's voice. Having recently read the previous Lassiter novel, I can tell you there are no such signs in the new one. Jake is as present as ever. I hope it's not another fourteen years before we see him again.