In The Vendetta Defense, bestselling author Lisa Scottoline delivers a wonderfully rich, vivid story of past sins, love, and justice.

Lawyer Judy Carrier takes the case of her career when an elderly pigeon racer named Anthony Lucia is arrested for the murder of his lifelong enemy, Angelo Coluzzi. "Pigeon Tony," as he's known to all his South Philly neighbors, confesses he killed Coluzzi because of a vendetta begun more than fifty years ago, a blood feud that has brought great tragedy to Pigeon Tony's life.

Her client's guilt, however, is only the beginning of Judy's problems. The Coluzzi family wants revenge, and they are determined to finish off Pigeon Tony and Judy before the case can go to trial. And if that isn't enough, Judy's got to contend with Tony's magnetic grandson, Frank, a man who makes her think about everything but the law, and her boss, the no-nonsense Bennie Rosato.

In a case steeped in blood and memory, it will take a stroke of brilliance to save Pigeon Tony. But if anyone just might see justice done, it's this gutsy young attorney who'll risk everything to win... including her life.

"Jack Newlin had no choice but to frame himself for murder."

When attorney Newlin discovers his wife dead in their elegant home, he's convinced he knows who killed her -- and is equally determined to hide the truth. He decides to take the rap, and to seal his fate he hires the most inexperienced lawyer he can find, a reluctant rookie by the name of Mary DiNunzio, from the hot Philadelphia firm of Rosato & Associates.

But hiring Mary may turn out to be his biggest mistake. Mary doubts Jack's confession, and her ethics and instincts tell her she can't defend a man who wants to convict himself. Smarter, gutsier, and more persistent than she has any right to be, Mary sets out to prove what really happened -- because, as any lawyer knows, a case is never as simple as it seems.

And nothing is ever certain until the final moment of truth.

Criminal lawyer Marta Richter is hours away from winning an acquittal for her client, millionaire businessman Elliot Steere, on trial for the murder of a homeless man who had tried to carjack him.

But as the jury begins deliberations, Marta discovers the chilling truth about her client's innocence. Taking justice into her own hands, she furiously sets out to prove the truth, with the help of two young associates.

In an excruciating game of beat-the-clock with both the jury and the worst blizzard to hit Philadelphia in decades, Marta will learn that the search for justice isn't only rough -- it can also be deadly.

Nothing can prepare criminal attorney Bennie Rosato for her new client, Alice Connolly, accused of murdering her lover, a highly decorated police detective. Connolly, who bears an uncanny physical resemblance to Bennie, tells the astonished lawyer, "Pleased to meet you. I'm your twin." But Bennie grew up an only child. She doesn't have a twin.

Or does she?

Bennie takes the case and plunges into the mystery of the murder, as well as the secret of her own identity. Not until the verdict is in will she finally learn the truth.