Patricia Smiley: 5 books

Assume nothing—that's the touchstone for every homicide investigation Detective Davie Richards undertakes. She approaches her latest case the same way, determined to learn as much about the victim as she does about the killer. But there's nothing about thirty-four-year-old Sara Montaine or her death...

Most cops spend their entire careers without firing a weapon in the line of duty. LAPD Homicide Detective Davie Richards is an outlier, a cop who killed a suspect to save another officer's life. While she waits for the police commission to rule on the shooting, she's called out to probe the...

The misdeeds and downfalls of characters drawn to the cultural panoply that is Los Angeles… The sun-kissed city of high hopes and second chances, where everyone seems to be from somewhere else. A siren’s call to dreamers, misfits, mystics and freaks, lost souls and purveyors of sin. They...

Homicide detective Davie Richards is called to an airport parking garage to investigate the shooting of a retired U.S. Army Ranger. Missing personal items point to a robbery, but Davie suspects a more sinister motive when she notices only one military dog tag around the Ranger's neck. Could the murderer...

Novel Ideas provides a substantial introduction to the elements of fiction followed by in-depth interviews with successful novelists who speak with candor and insight into the complex process by which a novel is made. This edition includes new and updated interviews as well as writing exercises to...