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3rd Degree

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Overview

The #1 bestselling new mystery series of the past decade comes roaring back with 3rd Degree, a shockingly suspenseful thriller featuring the Women's Murder Club.

One of James Patterson's best loved heroines is about to die. Detective Lindsay Boxer is jogging along a beautiful San Francisco street when a fiery explosion rips through the neighborhood. A town house owned by an Internet millionaire is immediately engulfed in flames, and when Lindsay plunges inside to search for survivors, she finds three people dead. An infant who lived in the house cannot be found - and a mysterious message at the scene leaves Lindsay and the San Francisco Police Department completely baffled.

Then a prominent businessman is found murdered under bizarre circumstances, with another mysterious message left behind by the killer. Lindsay asks her friends Claire Washburn of the medical examiner's office, Assistant D.A. Jill Bernhardt, and Chronicle reporter Cindy Thomas to help her figure out who is committing these murders-and why they are intent on killing someone every three days.

Even more terrifying, the killer has targeted one of the four friends who call themselves the Women's Murder Club.

Which one will it be?

While the investigation rages furiously, Lindsay works very closely with a federal officer assigned to the case. At the same time, she learns that one member of the Women's Murder Club is hiding a secret so dangerous and unbelievable that it could destroy them all.

Editorial Reviews

From the start, Patterson's Women's Murder Club series (1st to Die; Second Chance) has felt like high-concept TV with a smart edge, featuring an appealing and reliable cast of four female crime busters (a cop, a prosecutor, a medical examiner, a reporter) who race along byzantine plot lines humming with blood and sex, romance and heartbreak. But Patterson is an author who will detonate readers' presumptions for the sake of story, and in the series third installment, the prolific author, working with frequent collaborator Gross (The Jester, etc.), defies expectations in a shocking way. Readers will love him for it. San Francisco Homicide lieutenant Lindsay Boxer, who narrates most of the action, is jogging with assistant DA Jill Barnhardt when Lindsay notices two things: first, bruises on Jill's shoulder; then the explosion of a nearby townhouse, into which Lindsay rushes to save a child. With the juxtaposition of these two plotlines, Patterson jumpstarts this enjoyably convoluted tale. The townhouse, home to a greedy CEO and his family, was destroyed by members of a terrorist group calling itself "August Spies"; Lindsay's chase after the group, which commits further killings, brings her into close proximity to what promises to be a new series regular, Joe Molinari, deputy director of the Office of Homeland Security. Love blooms for Lindsay but, meanwhile, love has curdled at Jill's house, where Jill's husband is abusing her. Then comes the big surprise, and the story's remainder plays out at high emotion and warp speed. There's a calculated feel to all that happens, but clever manipulation of an audience serves Patterson as well as it served Hitchcock: his fans will only clamor for more. (One-day laydown Mar. 1) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information. -- PUBLISHERS WEEKLY.

Author Information

Bio of James Patterson

The subject of a recent Time magazine feature called, "The Man Who Can't Miss," James Patterson is the bestselling author of the past year, bar none, with more than 16 million books sold in North America alone. In 2007, one of every 15 hardcover fiction books sold was a Patterson title. In total, James's books have sold an estimated 150 million copies worldwide. He is the first author to have #1 new titles simultaneously on The New York Times adult and children's lists and is the only author to have five new hardcover novels debut at #1 on the list in one year -- a record-breaking feat he's accomplished every year since 2005. To date, James Patterson has had nineteen consecutive #1 New York Times Bestselling Novels, and holds the New York Times record for most bestselling titles by a single author (40 total). Patterson is a champion of reading and the founder of the PageTurner awards, which seek to spread the excitement and joy of books and reading in the United States. James's first foray into family fiction, the critically acclaimed Maximum Ride series, debuted on the New York Times list at #1 and remained there for 12 straight weeks. The series has so far made appearances on The New York Times bestsellers lists 87 times, proving that kids of all ages love page turners. Patterson is the creator of the #1 new detective series of the past dozen years, featuring "Alex Cross" and including the Hollywood-adapted "Along Came a Spider" and "Kiss the Girls," starring Academy Award-winning actor Morgan Freeman. He is also the creator of the #1 new detective series of the past five years, featuring Lindsay Boxer and the other members of the Women's Murder Club, from which the ABC television drama series is adapted. He has authored books behind six films on the Hollywood fast-track, including the upcoming Maximum Ride movie from Avi Arad, the producer of X-Men and Spiderman. Most recently, New Regency Pictures has optioned The Dangerous Days of Daniel X, James's newest family Pageturner due out in July of 2008.

Bio of Andrew Gross

Andrew Gross coauthored 2nd Chance and The Jester with James Patterson. He lives with his wife, Lynn, and their three children in Westchester County, New York.

Customer Reviews

  • 5 stars out of 5Didn't want it to end

    Posted June 25, 2009 by Dee, Jamaica

    Very good read! could hardly put it down

Additional Info

Imprint

Hachette Book Group USA

Filesize

808.6 KB

Number of Pages

368

eBook ISBN

0316007870

Excerpt from: 3rd Degree by James Patterson

Chapter 1

IT WAS A CLEAR, calm, lazy April morning, the day the worst week of my life began.
I was jogging down by the bay with my border collie, Martha. It's my thing Sunday mornings - get up early and cram my meaningful other into the front seat of the Explorer. I try to huff out three miles, from Fort Mason down to the bridge and back. Just enough to convince myself I'm bordering on something called in shape at thirty-six.
That morning, my buddy Jill came along. To give her baby Lab, Otis, a run, or so she claimed. More likely, to warm herself up for a bike sprint up Mount Tamalpais or whatever Jill would do for real exercise later in the day.
It was hard to believe that it had been only five months since Jill lost her baby. Now here she was, her body toned and lean again.
"So, how did it go last night?" she asked, shuffling sideways beside me. "Word on the street is, Lindsay had a date." "You could call it a date. . . ," I said, focusing on the heights of Fort Mason, which weren't getting closer fast enough for me. "You could call Baghdad a vacation spot, too." She winced. "Sorry I brought it up."
All run long, my head had been filled with the annoying recollection of Franklin Fratelli, "asset remarketing" mogul (which was a fancy way of saying he sent goons after the dot-com busts who could no longer make the payments on their Beemers and Franck Mullers). For two months Fratelli had stuck his face in my office every time he was in the Hall, until he wore me down enough to ask him up for a meal on Saturday night (the short ribs braised in port wine I had to pack back into the fridge after he bailed on me at the last minute).
"I got stood up," I said, mid-stride. "Don't ask, I won't tell the details."
We pulled up at the end of Marina Green, a lung-clearing bray from me while Mary Decker over there bobbed on her toes as if she could go another loop.
"I don't know how you do it," I said, hands on hips, trying to catch my breath.
"My grandmother," she said, shrugging and stretching out a hamstring. "She started walking five miles a day when she was sixty. She's ninety now. We have no idea where she is."
We both started to laugh. It was good to see the old Jill trying to peek through. It was good to hear the laughter back in her voice.
"You up for a mochachino?" I asked. "Martha's buying." "Can't. Steve's flying in from Chicago. He wants to bike up to see the Dean Friedlich exhibit at the Legion of Honor as soon as he can get in and change. You know what the puppy's like when he doesn't get his exercise."
I frowned. "Somehow it's hard for me to think of Steve as a puppy."
Jill nodded and pulled off her sweatshirt, lifting her arms. "Jill," I gasped, "what the hell is that?"
Peeking out through the strap of her exercise bra were a couple of small, dark bruises, like finger marks.
She tossed her sweatshirt over her shoulder, seemingly caught off guard. "Mashed myself getting out of the shower," she said. "You should get a load of how it looks." She winked. I nodded, but something about the bruise didn't sit well with me. "You sure you don't want that coffee?" I asked.
"Sorry ...You know El Exigente, if I'm five minutes late, he starts to see it as a pattern." She whistled for Otis and began to jog back to her car. She waved. "See you at work."
"So how about you?" I knelt down to Martha. "You look like a mochachino would do the trick." I snapped on her leash and started to trot off toward the Starbucks on Chestnut. The Marina has always been one of my favorite neighborhoods.
Curling streets of colorful, restored town houses. Families, the sound of gulls, the sea air off the bay.
I crossed Alhambra, my eye drifting to a beautiful three-story town house I always passed and admired. Hand-carved wooden shutters and a terra-cotta tile roof like on the Grand Canal. I held Martha as a car passed by.