Bøker av Allen Eskens

After the murder of her best friend, a librarian's search for answers leads back to her own dark secrets in this sweeping novel about a woman transformed by war, family, vengeance, and love, from award-winning writer Allen Eskens.Hana Babic is a quiet, middle-aged librarian in Minnesota who wants nothing more than to be left alone. But when a detective arrives with the news that her best friend has been murdered, Hana knows that something evil has come for her, a dark remnant of the past she and her friend had shared.Thirty years before, Hana was someone else: Nura Divjak, a teenager growing up in the mountains of war-torn Bosnia-until Serbian soldiers arrived to slaughter her entire family before her eyes. The events of that day thrust Nura into the war, leading her to join a band of militia fighters, where she became not only a fierce warrior but a legend-the deadly Night Mora. But a shattering final act forced Nura to flee to the United States with a bounty on her head.Now, someone is hunting Hana, and her friend has paid the price, leaving her eight-year-old grandson in Hana's care. To protect the child without revealing her secret, Hana must again become the Night Mora-and hope she can find the killer before the past comes for them, too.

A lawyer's race to reveal a wrongful conviction collides with the dark shadow of a murder in his own home in this propulsive and perfectly-plotted thriller from "one of our best crime writers at the top of his game" (William Kent Krueger, New York Times bestselling author). "Ambitious, absorbing, and deeply satisfying."―Kirkus Reviews (starred review) "Eskens brilliantly combines legal and personal drama." ―Publishers Weekly (starred review) "Superb . . . another Eskens novel to be savored." ―South Florida Sun-Sentinel When Boady Sanden first receives the case of Elijah Matthews, he's certain there's not much he can do. Elijah, who believes himself to be a prophet, has been locked up in a psychiatric hospital for the past four years, convicted of brutally murdering the pastor of a megachurch. But as a law professor working for the Innocence Project, Boady agrees to look into Elijah's file. When he does, he is alarmed to find threads that lead back to the death of his colleague and friend, Ben Pruitt, a man shot to death four years earlier in Boady's own home. Ben's daughter, Emma, has lived with Boady and Boady's wife Dee ever since that awful night. Now fourteen years old, Emma has been growing distant, and soon makes a fateful choice that takes her far from the safety of her godparents. Desperate to bring her home, and to free an innocent man, Boady must do all he can to investigate Elijah's case while fighting to save the family he has deeply come to love. Written with energy, propulsion, and his characteristic pathos and insight, Eskens delivers another pitch-perfect legal thriller that reveals a twisted murder and explores faith, love, family, and redemption along the way.

Investigating the wrongful conviction of Elijah Matthews for the Innocence Project, attorney Boady Sanden discovers a link between Elijah's case and the death of his best friend, Ben, and when Ben's 14-year-old daughter makes a fateful choice, he will do anything to bring her home and free an innocent man.

Three fathers collide far beyond the reach or safety of the law in this breathtaking thriller from the beloved author of The Stolen Hours and The Life We Bury and "one of our best crime writers at the top of his game" (William Kent Krueger, New York Times bestselling author).Max Rupert has left his position as a Minneapolis homicide detective to live in solitude. Mourning the tragic death of his wife, he's also racked by guilt-he alone knows what happened to her killer. But then the former local sheriff, Lyle Voight, arrives with a desperate plea: Lyle's daughter Sandy and his six-year-old grandson Pip have disappeared. Lyle's certain Sandy's ex-husband Reed is behind it, but the new sheriff is refusing to investigate. When Max reluctantly looks into their disappearance, he too becomes convinced something has gone very wrong. But the closer Max and Lyle get to finding proof, the more slippery Reed becomes, until he makes a break for the beautiful but formidable Boundary Waters wilderness with vulnerable Pip in tow.Racing after the most dangerous kind of criminal-a desperate father-and with the ghosts of their own pasts never far behind, Max and Lyle go on the hunt within a treacherous landscape, determined to bring an evil man to justice, and to bring a terrified child home alive. "Allen Eskens . . . produces some of the best cat-and-mouse games I have read. This is a novel that you will not easily forget." -BookReporter"The search for mother and child fuels the brisk plot, but Forsaken Country spins on Eskens' in-depth character studies. . . . Eskens is at the top of his skills." -Oline H. Cogdill, The South Florida Sun Sentinel"The suspense never flags . . . heart-pounding and heartfelt, Forsaken Country should be at the top of your to-be-read list."- Heather Gudenkauf

A coming-of-age story from the award-winning author of The Lives We Bury and The Shadows We Hide.

A young reporter must come to terms with his past - and present - while investigating the murder of a man he believes could be his father.