Michael Beck
1) The summons
Author
Accelerated Reader
IL: UG - BL: 5.8 - AR Pts: 13
Language
English
Formats
Description
"Once Judge Atlee was a powerful figure in Clanton, Mississippi--a pillar of the community who towered over local law and politics for forty years. Now the judge is a shadow of his former self, a sick, lonely old man who has withdrawn to his sprawling ancestral home. Knowing the end is near, Judge Atlee has issued a summons for his two sons to return to Clanton to discuss his estate. Ray Atlee is the eldest, a Virginia law professor, newly single...
Author
Series
Jake Brigance novels volume 3
Language
English
Description
Clanton, Mississippi. 1990. Jake Brigance finds himself embroiled in a deeply divisive trial when the court appoints him attorney for Drew Gamble, a timid sixteen-year-old boy accused of murdering a local deputy. Many in Clanton want a swift trial and the death penalty, but Brigance digs in and discovers that there is more to the story than meets the eye. Jake’s fierce commitment to saving Drew from the gas chamber puts his career, his financial...
Author
Language
English
Appears on list
Description
For most of the last hundred years, Biloxi was known for its beaches, resorts, and seafood industry. But it had a darker side. It was also notorious for corruption and vice, everything from gambling, prostitution, bootleg liquor, and drugs to contract killings. The vice was controlled by small cabal of mobsters, many of them rumored to be members of the Dixie Mafia. Keith Rudy and Hugh Malco grew up in Biloxi in the sixties and were childhood friends,...
Author
Accelerated Reader
IL: UG - BL: 6.9 - AR Pts: 24
Language
English
Description
Pete Banning was Clanton's favorite son, a returning war hero, the patriarch of a prominent family, a farmer, father, neighbor, and a faithful member of the Methodist church. Then one cool October morning in 1946, he rose early, drove into town, walked into the church, and calmly shot and killed the Reverend Dexter Bell. As if the murder wasn't shocking enough, it was even more baffling that Pete's only statement about it - to the sheriff, to his...
5) The appeal
Author
Accelerated Reader
IL: UG - BL: 7 - AR Pts: 19
Language
English
Description
In a crowded courtroom in Mississippi, a jury returns a shocking verdict against a chemical company accused of dumping toxic waste into a small town's water supply, causing the worst cancer cluster un history. The company appeals to the Mississippi Supreme Court, whose nine justices will one day either approve the verdict or reverse it.
Author
Accelerated Reader
IL: UG - BL: 6 - AR Pts: 16
Language
English
Description
In a small Florida town, a young lawyer is shot to death. A young black man, a former client, named Quincy Miller is charged and convicted. For 22 years, Miller maintains his innocence from inside prison. Finally, Guardian Ministries takes on Miller's case, but the Episcopal minister in charge gets more than he bargained for as powerful people do not want Miller exonerated.
7) The brethren
Author
Accelerated Reader
IL: UG - BL: 6.2 - AR Pts: 17
Language
English
Description
They call themselves the Brethren: three disgraced former judges doing time in a Florida federal prison. One was sent up for tax evasion. Another, for skimming bingo profits. The third for a career-ending drunken joyride. Meeting daily in the prison law library, taking exercise walks in their boxer shorts, these judges-turned-felons can reminisce about old court cases, dispense a little jailhouse justice, and contemplate where their lives went wrong....
8) The broker
Author
Accelerated Reader
IL: UG - BL: 5.9 - AR Pts: 16
Language
English
Formats
Description
In his final hours in the Oval Office, the outgoing President grants a controversial last-minute pardon to Joel Backman, a notorious Washington power broker who has spent the last six years hidden away in a federal prison. What no one knows is that the President issues the pardon only after receiving enormous pressure from the CIA. It seems Backman, in his power broker heyday, may have obtained secrets that compromise the worlds most sophisticated...
Author
Accelerated Reader
IL: UG - BL: 6.8 - AR Pts: 19
Language
English
Formats
Description
In 1970, one of Mississippi's more colorful weekly newspapers went bankrupt. To the surprise and dismay of many, ownership was assumed by a 23 year-old college dropout, named Willie Traynor. The future of the paper looked grim until a young mother was brutally raped and murdered by a member of the notorious Padgitt family. Willie Traynor reported all the gruesome details and the paper began to prosper. The murderer, Danny Padgitt was tried before...
10) The Partner
Author
Accelerated Reader
IL: UG - BL: 5.6 - AR Pts: 17
Language
English
Formats
Description
Patrick Lanigan was a young partner in a prominent Biloxi law firm. He had a pretty wife, a new daughter, and a bright future. One winter night, Patrick apparently died, trapped in a burning car. He watched his own funeral, then fled. Six weeks later, a fortune was stolen from his law firm's offshore account.
11) The runaway jury
Author
Accelerated Reader
IL: UG - BL: 8 - AR Pts: 23
Language
English
Formats
Description
In the middle of a multimillion-dollar legal hurricane, a jury must make a decision in a precedent-setting lawsuit against a tobacco giant. But few know the truth: this jury has a leader, and the jury belongs to him.