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Suspicion of Malice

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Once they were lovers planning to marry until Anthony Quintana turned his back on his obligation to the law, forcing Gail Connor to walk out on him. He went to Spain to forget his feeling of betrayal while she remained in Miami just as determined to overcome her feeling of deceit. She started to make a life for herself and her daughter from a previous relationship. Unbeknownst to Anthony when he left her, Gail was pregnant with his child.

A chance encounter with Anthony's eighteen-year old daughter Angela results in Gail accepting the teen's boyfriend Bobby as a client. Bobby, who has been previously convicted of some petty criminal activity, is suspected of killing Roger Cresswell, owner of Cresswell Yachts, who fired the lad for allegedly stealing. One person who Bobby insists can provide him with an alibi and prove he is not guilty is Judge Nathan Harris, a person under consideration for an appointment to the US District Court. Heeding the advice of his attorney, Nathan sends his lawyer Anthony to deal with Gail. As the two former lovers closely work together to prove Bobby's innocence, their relationship flares to life once again.

As suspense novels go, the Connor-Quintana novels rank with the best ones, but SUSPICION OF MALICE provides the audience much more than an exciting legal thriller. The tale is a relationship drama that will remind readers of the works of Delinsky and Siddons. The investigation is fascinating but the heart and soul of the tale rests in the relationship between Gail and Anthony, two obstinate but compatible individuals. Barbara Parker shows much talent in this exciting thriller has cross-genre appeal.

Harriet Klausner

Barbara Parker cleverly entwines the emotional tension between her two series characters, Miami lawyer Gail Connor and her former fiancé, Cuban criminal attorney Anthony Quintana, with a whodunit puzzle among the vicious rich.

Found murdered in his cousin's backyard after a wild party, Roger Cresswell, heir to a yacht-building fortune, turns out to have been spectacularly unpopular. His bimbo wife was sleeping with the aforementioned cousin, his ill father furiously regretted turning over the reins of his company, his uncle feared discovery of his embezzlements, the uncle's clever wife and her lover, the yacht-yard supervisor, feared that Roger was going to run the venerable company into the ground.

But with all these great suspects to choose from, the police focus on a young Puerto Rican ballet dancer from the New York slums. Though Connor is no criminal lawyer, Quintana's daughter Angela begs her to take on the dancer, her secret boyfriend. Connor tracks down the dancer's reluctant alibi witness (a judicial candidate) and discovers Quintana is his lawyer.

The tension of their recent, explosive break-up is exacerbated by Connor's pregnancy. She has not told Quintana and is considering abortion. And the dancer is seeing Angela against her father's express wishes. But Connor and Quintana manage to team up to clear Connor's client and keep Quintana's out of it - by presenting the police with a new suspect. All this sounds convoluted, even contrived when I say it, but Parker makes it sound quite reasonable.

The detective and legal work is clever and though the rich family is typically corrupt and dysfunctional, the sparks between the two likable protagonists keep things lively. Parker's literate writing style and thoughtful characterizations is highly satisfying.

I have really enjoyed the Gail Connor/Anthony Quintana series; however, I was disappointed in the last one. But Parker has really redeemed herself. The characters sizzle along, the plot is unusual and interesting, and the resurrection of the love story which appeared doomed (stay tuned) was done quite well... I was happy that Gail seems to be acting more responsibly and ethically and thus more believable - she is flawed, but not stupid... One suggestion - the relationships of the various characters took awhile to iron out, and other than the "surprise" one - perhaps it would have been helpful to include a family "tree" in the opening pages - it would have helped to focus on the story as it got going.....

in Barbara Parker's continuing "Suspicion" series.

The on-again, off-again romance of Gail Connor and Anthony Quintana has the stage set by a murder; each has a client that is on the fringe of the killing, and each has to support each other to insure that the real killer is unmasked.

Dysfunctional is the middle name of each person in the Cresswell family. Each remaining person, that is, because the book opens with the suspicious murder of Roger Cresswell, a killing that keeps tying back to Maggie Cresswell, his sister, who had been a victim of what seemed like suicide in a prior year. Anthony's daughter Angela, returns, getting Gail involved in the criminal defense (not a specialty of Gail's) to defend the boy she loves, dancer Bobby Gonzalez. Although Bobby is entangled in the background of the killing, so many of the Cresswells have motive, and so few of them have any admirable qualities, it seems that Gail and Anthony, working together against their better judgement, must pull the responsibility back to one of them, but whom?

Both Anthony and Gail, single parents and very different in heritage and background, leave the reader wondering about their attraction, and attraction it is, despite their break up in a prior instalment of the series. Although they remain together at the end of the book, it is only with some tragedy in their own lives, which draws the reader even closer to them.

The Miami setting is well-told in Parker's novels, and the romance never interferes with the mystery, just enhances it. A great read from a fine writer!

SUSPICION OF MALICE (Suspense) Barbara Parker Dutton - May 2000 ISBN: 0525945423

Suspicion of Malice is the third installment of Gail Conner and Anthony Quintana--Suspicion of Deceit was first and Suspicion Betrayal was second.

The barbaric murder of Roger Cresswell took place in the shadows of an exclusive party on the Miami waterfront. The Victim is the heir to a yacht building family, and the suspects abound within this family driven by jealousy, greed, and malice. Bobby Gonzales is accused of killing Cresswell, and he is the secret lover of Angela Quintana. Angela goes to Gail Conner (her fathers ex-lover) and asks her to help clear Bobby. Angela tells Gail that Bobby has an airtight alibi that happens to be represented by Anthony Quintana. The air crackles with electricity when Anthony and Gail find themselves locked together on opposite sides of a capital case, but with an innocent mans life hanging in the balance, there is no room for venomous emotions and no margin for error, somehow they must work together to save Bobby's life. Could this case destroy whatever is left of their relationship completely or bring them closer than ever before?

Barbara Parker writes piercing dialogue and brings a great cast of characters who are very interesting to life. The plot moved swiftly to a gratifying end. Best of all was the sparks between the two protagonists that kept things animated throughout the book.

Pam Stone

When the body of Roger Cresswell, heir to the Cresswell yacht building fortune, is discovered brutally slain, everyone at the party that he had been attending immediately becomes a suspect. The one with the most to lose seems to be Judge Nate Harris who is expecting to be nominated to the Florida Supreme Court and retains Anthony Quintana as his lawyer. Ballet dancer Bobby Gonzales is also a suspect, and his girlfriend Angela (also Anthony Quintana's daughter) asks lawyer Gail Connor to represent Bobby.

This book is third in the Gail Connor/Anthony Quintana series, and in this book they've recently broken off their engagement and both are depressed and angry about the way their relationship ended. Their work on solving this case thrusts them together, and they reach an uneasy truce in their working relationship. They struggle to uncover the facts surrounding Roger Cresswell's life and death, and find that the Cresswell family had plenty of skeletons in the closet, and any one of them may have had a motive to kill Roger.

This legal thriller has plenty of plot twists and intrigue and will keep you guessing almost until the brutal end. The legal challenges as well as the emotional roller-coaster of Gail and Anthony's relationship will keep you involved until the end and looking forward to the next book in this interesting series from Barbara Parker.

After Miami attorney Gail Connor's breakup with Anthony Quintana, she concentrates her energies on building up her law practice. While her practice is concentrated chiefly on civil matters, she can't say no when Anthony's teenage daughter begs her to help her boyfriend, a young man from the wrong side of the tracks accused of murdering the heir to a ship-building fortune. It doesn't help that Anthony not only disapproves of the young man, but represents a potential alibi witness who doesn't want to testify. Further complicating matters for Gail is her secret pregnancy. The character and story-line development is strong and exciting as Gail and Anthony work, often at loggerheads, to unravel the mystery and unmask a killer. Will Gail and Anthony get back together as a couple? Read the book, because I'm not telling!

Getting a new Gail Conner novel is like welcoming an old friend who's been away. I had my fingers crossed throughout the story that Gail and Anthony would come to their senses in the midst of this tangled web of family deceit and murder which kept me guessing till the end. Parker is a master of dialogue and keeps the plot swiftly moving. A very enjoyable read.

Donada Peters does so much more than read the words in Parker's books. She brings operatic talent and range in accents to bring the cast of characters to life, both male and female. The romantic magnetism between Anthony and Gail has left me eager for the next title, and distressed not to find an unabridged reading by Ms. Peters for the subsequent Parker titles. I am on hold in hope.

This book is awsome! Amazon had suggessted that I would like this book when I was purchasing another one which was also another great book. So I read the first few pages that it gives you as a tease and decided to buy it as well. Now I'm going to the library in a few days when my request comes through for the first book of the series for this writer because this book was just that good. The twists that this book had kept me haning everytime I turned the page. It was very hard to put down and walk away.