Guilty Minds (*Nick Heller, book #3)
by Joseph Finder

• ISBN-10: 0525954627
•  ISBN-13: 9780525954620

400 Pages
Dutton
    an imprint of Penguin Publishing

www.josephfinder.com

RJ says: "Guilty Minds is a guilty pleasure you will not regret indulging. "

Joseph Finder knows what readers want from a book and delivers it in spades. Finder doesn't just haphazardly, willy-nilly turn out books...we have to wait. And boy oh boy is it worth the wait.

If The National Inquiry and TMZ had a love-child it would be called Slander Sheet. "SS" is a sleazy website known for salacious, gotcha' articles. You know the kind most everybody reads, but no one admits to reading. Now SS has set its' sights high. Their target? Supreme Court Chief Justice Jeremiah Claflin. In 48 hours the website plans to run a story claiming, that on more than one occasion Chief Justice Claflin retained the services of Kayla Pitts (aka Heidi L'Amour), a high class, high price lady of the night.


Nick Heller, private investigator to the rich and famous is contacted by Washington, D.C. insider and attorney to the rich and famous regarding an urgent matter. Gideon Parnell has done it all. . . marched with Martin Luther King Jr. . .played golf with every sitting President since Lyndon Johnson. . .and whose client list reads like a who's who of the Bilderberg Group. After a lil' back and forth, they sign a non-disclosure agreement and Heller goes to meet face to face with Chief Justice Jeremiah Claflin. Flatly denying the accusations, Claflin assures Heller his alibi is rock solid. However, he refuses to divulge his true whereabouts publicly. So Heller will have to find another way to discredit the story.

But Slander does what that kind of site is notorious for, jumps the deadline and runs the story early. Nick Heller forces Slander to print a retraction when basic fact checking proves Miss Pitts rendezvous story was pure fiction. Slander's reputation is ruined, reporter Mandy Seeger is fired and the case is closed for Claflin and Parnell. But not for Heller. Feeling he has barely scratched the surface of a much deeper plot to ruin a sitting Supreme Court Justice he 's determined to unravel this widening web of deceit and betrayal. Now fearing for Kayla Pitts' safety Heller tries to hide her until he can figure everything out. When his efforts prove futile, he teams up with former Slander Sheet reporter, Mandy Seeger and together they navigate a side of D.C. you won't find on any tourist map.

Twists and turns in all the right places multiply the intensity til I was in a state of near breathlessness when they uncovered the secret owners of Slander Sheet. Cool, modern spy techie stuff plays a major role throughout the novel and Finder does an exceptional job weaving how it works into the narrative. The plot is relevant, thoroughly developed and could easily be a story on the 6 o'clock news. Guilty Minds is fast paced, filled with action, has cool stuff and there's even a hint of romance.
 I look forward to "seeing" Nick Heller again. I just hope I don't have to wait five years.

**Guilty Minds is the third book starring private investigator to the stars, Nick Heller. Don't worry if you haven't read Vanished or Buried Secrets, Guilty Minds reads just fine as a stand-alone. (But, you'll probably want to read the others as soon as you finish this one.)

Happy Reading!

RJ 







Nick Heller               Nick Heller
(book 1)                      (book 2)