Peyton Shields had known from the time she was a child that she wanted to be a doctor. Now, she's in her first year or residency at a major Boston children's hospital. She's made it to the top through relentless drive, stellar academic credentials, and a mountain of debt to Harvard Medical School. She's working impossibly long hours but she has the life she wants, and that includes being happily married to an up-and-coming young lawyer. Then, late one night, driving home through a heavy snowstorm, she sees a car coming straight toward her, driving her off the road and into a frozen pond. Rescue comes in the form of a man who pulls her from the wreckage and walks away. Yet nobody believes her story, that the "accident" was no accident. This is the first in a series of strange, escalating events that take Peyton deeper into danger from a faceless enemy who seems to know her every move. And, she has to turn her considerable determination into catching a killer before he catches her.
After twelve years as a trial lawyer with Miami's most prestigious law firm, James Grippando is now a national best-selling author of thirteen suspenseful thrillers in as many years, including Lying with Strangers, When Darkness Falls, Got the Look, Hear No Evil, Last to Die, Beyond Suspicion, A King's Ransom, Under Cover of Darkness, Found Money, The Abduction, The Informant and The Pardon. His first novel for young adults, Leapholes, was published in 2006, as well as his first short-story, Operation Northwoods, which appeared in the critically acclaimed Thriller anthology. His novels are enjoyed worldwide in twenty-four languages.
James's first job out of law school plunged him headlong into death penalty cases. That experience was an inspiration for his 1994 debut novel, The Pardon, a legal thriller that critics heralded as a "bona fide blockbuster." Beyond Suspicion (2002) was the long-awaited sequel to that first novel, and it launched an exciting new series that features Miami criminal defense attorney Jack Swyteck and that critics have heralded as "John Grisham meets Robert Ludlum."
As a lawyer, James was an avid writer. His numerous scholarly articles appeared in some of nation's top law reviews, and they are frequently cited with approval by the courts. His trial practice ranged from complex corporate litigation to class actions on behalf of chicken farmers. As a frequent volunteer in Florida's guardian ad litem program, he helped provide legal representation to neglected children in family court proceedings. He was a faculty member with the National Institute of Trial Advocacy and an adjunct professor of trial advocacy at Nova Southeast University. He was named by Florida Trend Magazine as one of Florida's emerging leaders, and in 2006 he received the Distinguished Author Award from Scranton University. His alma mater is the University of Florida, where he graduated second in his undergraduate class and earned his law degree with honors. He now serves Of Counsel to David Boies' law firm, Boies Schiller & Flexner, LLP.
James lives and writes in Coral Gables, Florida, and he is married to Tiffany, who has been his unofficial editor since book one.
