The Night She Came Home [Paperback]

Lori Derby Bingley has created some very memorable characters in this book , brought to life by her great talent! These characters will stay with you long after you've put down the book!

An amazing debut by a very powerful author with great potential for the future!

As a successful defense attorney, Jesse has dealt regularly with people guilty of such crimes and has even managed to set some of them free, sending them on their merry way in a salute to the justice system and all of its inherent ironies. Having transferred from a New York law firm to one in New Jersey, she has built up a solid reputation for professional excellence, in fact. Jesse never dreamed the man suspected of killing her husband would seek her representation, but Dr. Kyle Whitman has done exactly that, albeit unknowingly.

Although it would be unethical to represent Kyle in a court of law, and could even result in a mistrial, Detective Paul Rawlings has urged Jesse to play along with Dr. Whitman's wishes and agree to consult on his case. The evidence against Kyle is purely circumstantial, and the police are in need of evidentiary proof that will hold up beneath the court's careful scrutiny. Jesse reluctantly offers her services to the handsome doctor, hoping that she is doing the right thing by doing so, and begins to dig deeper into a case that's painfully personal.

Is Dr. Kyle Whitman guilty or innocent: a victim of sabotage or the perpetrator of a cunning crime? Jesse has only her instincts to guide her, and the escalating fatality rate to warn her that evidence can lie, and love can bloom in even the darkest garden.

Taut, tense and terrifically suspenseful, The Night She Came Home is Lori Derby Bingley's debut novel, and what a fabulous first impression she has made! Fooling readers about a killer's identity - and the motivations behind such a crime - can be an incredibly difficult task to master, but the ample twists and turns of Ms. Bingley's plot baffled and befuddled this reviewer as few novels of recent memory have done. Jesse and Kyle's relationship has a dubious beginning, it's true, as secrets and suspicions taint what they tentatively share and color their perceptions. There's also a faint whiff of implausibility to their quickly developing relationship: precisely where, when and how they fall in love is a mystery best left unsolved.

I recommend you focus instead on Ms. Bingley's clean, precise prose and the plot's mounting tensions, both sensual and anticipatory. Time is tick-ticking away, and with every new obstacle placed in Kyle and Jesse's path, a new challenge must be analyzed, thought through and overcome. Disappearing evidence, physical threats, and encounters in dark alleyways are sharp counterpoints to the embedded love story. Eventually, readers will learn that the past and present are tied together with a neatly intertwining bow, but not before Ms. Bingley leads readers on a merry chase. The Night She Came Home will have you reading into the wee hours of the morning, so plan your day accordingly, and indulge yourself with a fictional foray into the "danger zone" -- where love, greed and murder collide with calamitous results.

Reviewed by C.L. Jeffries