A dedicated lawyer works to exonerate an innocent woman on death row for the murder of her three children in a legal thriller by the author of The Good Twin (2018).

In the late 1990s, Becky Whitlaw was a young working-class mother in Glen Brook, Texas, when her husband, Grady, was killed in an auto accident. Nine months later, a 23-year-old widow with two toddlers and a new baby, Becky feels old and exhausted, and her life seems out of control. She even wonders sometimes if she wouldn’t be better off if her children had never been born. When her house is consumed by flames with her children inside as she sobs on the porch, “It’s my fault,” it doesn’t take long for investigators to conclude that she set the fire herself. In spite of her denials, she is charged and brought to trial and, after only two days of testimony, convicted of murder and sentenced to death. Years later, Dani Trumball, an attorney for the Help Innocent Prisoners Project, learns of Becky’s case and agrees to try to get her a new trial, in hopes that new evidence will prove her innocent of starting the fire that caused her children’s deaths. While juggling her own family challenges, including adjusting to a West Coast life after a cross-country move with her husband and two children, Dani works tirelessly to unearth old leads and witnesses, all the while knowing that even her best efforts might not be enough. A veteran author of novels about legal injustices, Green is a masterful storyteller, and her narrative fascinates from the first page to the last as she describes the uphill battle faced by those who try to prove the innocence of convicted felons. In addition to providing educational and electrifying details of Dani’s investigation and court battles, Green gives empathetic attention to the details of the attorney’s personal life, drawing parallels between Dani and Becky as wives and mothers and creating a tale that combines courtroom and family drama.

A captivating and intimate look at injustices in the judicial system.

Separated at birth, twin sisters are embroiled in a murder plot—against each other.

In Green’s (Justice Delayed, 2017, etc.) novel, Mallory Holcolm is working as a waitress in New York City when a patron confuses her for the owner of a nearby art gallery. When she spies blonde-haired, blue-eyed Charlotte “Charly” Gordon at Jensen Galleries, Mallory knows their similarities are too striking to be a coincidence—Charly is her twin sister. But while Mallory grew up in poverty with their biological mother, Charly enjoyed a life of privilege with her wealthy, adoptive family. So when Charly’s husband, Ben Gordon, asks Mallory to help him murder his wife and then split her fortune, she reluctantly agrees. First, Ben must wait for Charly’s adoptive father to die before he can change her will. In the meantime, like a sinister Pygmalion, Ben will teach Mallory to impersonate her sister, whose style and physique are more refined than hers, to seal the deal. Mallory seems a bit naïve to trust Ben without attempting to contact Charly on her own. In fact, Charly hasn’t been told that Mallory exists and is too busy caring for her ailing father to notice that her long-lost sister and her husband are plotting against her. But when the taut narrative smoothly shifts to her point of view, it’s less clear which of the two sisters is the titular good twin, because Charly harbors intriguing secrets of her own. Eventually, the mounting tension between these two strong characters, despite each woman’s desire to learn the other’s long-held family secrets, becomes the chilling story’s most powerful element. And this extreme case of sibling rivalry also deftly brings up the question of nature vs. nurture—is money the root of evil or is it genetics? Either way, the two sisters in this gripping tale are in for a tearful reunion when manipulative Ben brings them together for the big reveal.

They’re siblings, but their blood runs cold, turning what could have been a heartwarming reunion into a heart-stopping thriller.