Praise for the Rosato & DiNunzio Series
“Scottoline’s merging of the themes of her family-driven stand-alone thrillers with her ongoing legal series continues to work splendidly.” –Booklist on Damaged
“Scottoline is an A-lister all the way, and her Rosato series is always an A-plus.” –Booklist (starred review)
“Scottoline’s third entry in her Rosato & DiNunzio series does not disappoint. Fans will be on the edge of their seats eager to discover what happens next.” –Library Journal (starred review) on Corrupted
“There is nothing as riveting as a skilled writer creating tense courtroom scenes and Scottoline does that in Corrupted.” –Huffington Post
“Scottoline excels at turning societal issues of the day into suspenseful plot points, a proclivity she takes to a whole new level in Corrupted, out-Grishaming Grisham. After twenty-plus books, she has written her best ever, as tightly fashioned as it is nail-bitingly suspenseful. A masterpiece of pitch-perfect storytelling balanced against emotional angst.” –Providence Journal
“Pop culture’s current crop of female lawyers owes a great deal to the attorneys at Rosato & Associates…The deliciously dramatic and slightly over-the-top Betrayed reaffirms that after more than twenty novels, the Edgar Award-winning Scottoline is still able to create surprising, suspenseful plots with likable, daring heroines at the center.” –The Washington Post
“Betrayed is populated with the kind of smart, funny women you love to watch working crime scenes.”—All You magazine
“Scottoline writes terrific legal fiction with warm, smart characters and lots of humor and heart. Her legion of fans will be happy with this one, and it should find her new readers as well.” —Booklist on Betrayed
“Accused is Scottoline in top form.” —Time.com
"Accused is a scorcher of a story...you'll be riveted till the very last page." —Linda Fairstein
“After some rockin’ standalones, Scottoline returns to her popular series about feisty all-female law firm Rosato and Associates. Nice to have them back.” —People magazine on Accused
★ 06/27/2016
In bestseller Scottoline’s outstanding 15th Rosato & DiNunzio novel (after 2015’s Corrupted), Mary DiNunzio, a partner in the Philadelphia law firm of Rosato & DiNunzio, takes on a heartbreaking case involving a dyslexic fifth grader, Patrick O’Brien, who’s bullied at school and is getting no support for his language disability. Patrick, who’s being raised by his paternal grandfather, allegedly attacked a school aid with scissors, and now the aid is suing both Patrick and the school board for damages. On the brink of her wedding to college professor Anthony Rotunno, Mary becomes emotionally attached to Patrick, more so than any previous client, and finds herself pitted against a diabolical attorney, Nick Machiavelli (aka the Dark Prince), who’s determined to win a settlement, despite the emotional cost to the 10-year-old boy. In her struggle to save Patrick, Mary finds herself fighting her associates, her fiancé, and social services. Tensions mount until the story concludes with a satisfying, unexpected twist. 400,000-copy announced first printing, author tour. Agent: Robert Gottlieb, Trident Media Group. (Aug.)
For the fourth installment of Lisa Scottoline's Rosato & DiNunzio series, narrator Rebecca Lowman takes the helm as Mary DiNunzio finds herself in a complex case just before her wedding. Lowman competently connects with the emotional element of the novel's plot, but Scottoline's tendency for extraneous explanations and excessive detail drags the momentum to a crawl. The awkward, unnatural- sounding dialogue is especially evident in the audiobook, and Lowman's efforts to smooth it into the high drama of the story often makes the situations and characters unconvincing. Listeners searching for an exciting legal thriller will do best to steer clear of this one. J.F. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine
2016-06-15
Mary DiNunzio, the second-best attorney in Philadelphia, is about to walk down the aisle when she gets sucked into the very real possibility of becoming a mother, or at least a foster mother, first.Retired accountant Edward O'Brien wants Mary's help in defending Patrick, the dyslexic 10-year-old grandson he's raising, from Steven Robertson, the teacher's aide at Grayson Elementary whose lawsuit alleges that Patrick attacked him with a pair of scissors. It's all nonsense, Edward insists: Patrick, though chronically humiliated by his primitive reading skills, his habit of throwing up when he's stressed out, and the constant bullying he attracts, wouldn't harm a fly. Besides, Robertson's suit is merely designed to deflect attention from the fact that the last time he caught Patrick throwing up, he punched the child hard enough to bruise his face. In fact, as Mary's swift and efficient investigation discloses, the situation is much worse than that; Robertson's abused Patrick sexually on at least three occasions. But Patrick keeps going disastrously off script, and Robertson's lawyer, Nick Machiavelli, justifying his claim to direct descent from the father of Renaissance realpolitik, ties Mary up in legal knots when Edward unexpectedly dies and she files an emergency appeal to become Patrick's temporary guardian. Even worse, there's evidence that Edward's death may have been murder, with Patrick the obvious suspect and Mary his obvious accomplice. Starting slowly, Scottoline expertly stokes the boiler to the bursting point, and readers will stay up long past their bedtimes watching Mary try to sweet-talk everyone from the family court judge to Anthony Rotunno, her fiance, who returns from a trip to California to a bombshell that forces him to reimagine his life with Mary in radically new terms. As usual with the firm of Rosato & DiNunzio (Corrupted, 2015, etc.), the complications aren't worked out nearly as carefully as they're piled up, and fans who race nonstop through the last hundred pages will be doing both themselves and Scottoline a favor.
