Spenser earned his degree in the school of hard knocks, so he is ready when a Boston university hires him to recover a rare, stolen manuscript. He is hardly surprised that his only clue is a radical student with four bullets in his chest. The cops are ready to throw the book at the pretty blond coed whose prints are all over the murder weapon but Spenser knows there are no easy answers. He tackles some very heavy homework and knows that if he doesn't finish his assignment soon, he could end up dead.

Veteran Reporter Jack McEvoy investigates - against the warnings of the police and his own Editor - and makes a shocking discovery that connects the crime to other mysterious deaths across the country. But his inquiry hits a snag when he himself becomes a suspect. As he races to clear his name, McEvoy's findings point to a serial killer working under the radar of law enforcement for years and using personal data shared by the victims themselves to select and hunt his targets.

Alexandra Avellino has just found her father's mutilated body and needs the police right away. She believes her sister killed him and that she is still in the house with a knife. Sofia Avellino has just found her father's mutilated body and needs the police right away. She believes her sister, Alexandra, did it and that she is still in the house, locked in the bathroom. Both women are to go on trial at the same time. A joint trial in front of one jury. But one of these women is lying. One of them is a murderer. 

Ex-military policeman Jack Reacher is a drifter. He's just passing through Margrave, Georgia, and in less than an hour, he's arrested for murder. Not much of a welcome. All Reacher knows is that he didn't kill anybody. At least not here. Not lately. But he doesn't stand a chance of convincing anyone. Not in Margrave, Georgia. Not a chance in hell.

Colter Shaw is a career "reward-seeker", making his living traveling the country and locating missing persons, collecting reward money in return. So it is not unusual when a wealthy entrepreneur hires him to track down his wife, an enigmatic artist who vanished one month before. As Shaw begins to investigate, he suspects that she was fleeing a bad marriage, and he follows her trail to an artists' retreat in Indiana. The case takes one surprising turn after another, and soon, Shaw begins to wonder if this mysterious woman is more of a captor than a captive.