The Nosy Neighbor
Fern Michaels
Pocket, Jun 2005, $7.99
ISBN: 0743477499

Her brother Steven Baker sitting second chair tries to make his sister Lucy feel better as they only did their job earning $500K defending Justin Riley, but she heeds the words of the grandmother of her acquitted client's victim that she rot in hell. Though "lucky" to have never lost a case, she feels she has lost much more successfully defending the guilty. Drunk to forget, not to celebrate, Lucy tells Steven no more taking criminal cases as she knows Justin killed the little girl.

Lucy flees to the suburbs to play tennis, jog, and walk her dog. However six months from the time she left defending the monstrous cretins of society, FBI Special Agents Harry Conover and Larry Smith confront her about her fianc Jonathan St. Clair, who they insist is Leo Banks from Ohio not Virginia. Lucy thinks about what she knows about Jonathan, but concludes that her information about him is vague. She needs to know the truth. As she makes inquiries, she also is exasperated with her nosy neighbor Wylie Wilson; following an accident Lucy can read minds enabling her to know whom to trust.

Fern Michaels provides an interesting paranormal romantic suspense thriller that never slows down from the moment that the Feds confront Lucy until the final clash. Lucy is terrific with and without her ESP skills while the support cast provides the depth to her investigation. Though some readers will believe that the paranormal element subtracts form a solid intrigue; others will find it enhances the plot; either case, Lucy's use of mind reading seems genuine as she goes from skeptic to believer as she stars as the main ingredient in this tense thriller.

Harriet Klausner