Done Gone Wrong

Done Gone Wrong is about Avery Andrews, an attorney who has been fired from her prestigious law firm in Columbia, South Carolina. This book is one in a series of murder/mysteries that Cathy Pickens writes. The mysteries are well developed and the characters well drawn. The humor with different characters, in particular, Avery's mom is great. I very much enjoyed the story.

Jake Baker has seduced Avery Andrews back to Charleston, SC. Not with his fabled charm and seductive wiles but with the chance to sit on the plaintiff's side of the docket in a suit against a large pharmaceutical firm. Uplift is an antidepressant drug, which seems to be a miracle drug for most people who take it. The FDA gave it their seal of approval. But the parent company has the deepest pockets, so they are the ones in court when a man who took Uplift brings his semiautomatic weapons to work and kills a mess of people before he kills himself. While in Charleston, Avery gets a call from the kid brother of an old romance. Mark Tilman has something very important to talk to Avery about, but he stands her up at the restaurant. Avery is shaken when she finds out that the crash she drove past on her way back to her hotel is where Mark Tilman died. His family wants Avery to look into the death, as they don't believe it was an accident. Naturally, Avery finds out that the Uplift case has strong ties to the important matter Mark wanted to bring to her attention. There are more deaths. Avery is almost killed, more than once. She does make the necessary connections, and saves Jakes butt as well as giving Mark Tilman's family some sense of justice being done. DONE GONE WRONG is a delightful second novel. Pickens' sense of place is wonderful, her characters a treat, and the mystery is just close enough to a possible truth to be more than a tad scary. DONE GONE WRONG will do right by you.

South Carolina lawyer Avery Andrews is back and this time she's in Charleston, teamed up with an old mentor named Jake Baker and they are suing a major drug company after a forklift operator shot up his workplace after taking one of their anti-depressants. However, getting evidence proving the drug was to blame for the man's mental breakdown isn't going to be easy, because the general opinion is that the drug is the next best thing since sliced bread. And then Dr. Mark Tilman the brother of one of Avery's old boy friends contacts her with about drug trials, but he's killed in an auto accident and then his house burns down and all of a sudden Avery is in trouble in this story that points fingers at how drug trials can held and how ruthless they can be. It's also a book that is very hard to put down. An excellent legal thriller that you won't want to miss.

Cathy Pickens has done gone and written another winner. This little murder mystery is a painless way to learn about the law and drug research-the workings of inner sanctums few of us have access to. Sprinkled in with the suspense and gravity are the quirky characters Pickens is noted for who will bring you smiles and maybe even a laugh or two.

Knowing the expert witness was lying, defense attorney Avery Andrews goaded him into saying things which caused a mistrial. Still Avery lost her job and returned home to Dacus to figure out what she is going to do with her life when Charlotte attorney Jake Baker asks her to help him with a class action suit against a pharmaceutical company. The plaintiffs claim that the anti-depressant Uplift made by Perforce Pharmaceuticals caused a man to go on a killing spree before he committed suicide. While Avery is helping Jake prepare for trial, she agrees to meet with Dr. Mark Tilman who she knows from Dacus. He stands her up but later she learns he was killed in a car accident that might be a hit and run. When his house burns down and a notebook he sent to his girlfriend is given to Avery she begins to think that a drug study he was involved in got him killed. When one of the patients in the study is found dead Avery decides to investigate and almost becomes a victim herself. Fans of southern down home regional mysteries will want to read DONE GONE WRONG, a legal thriller that paints a frightening pictures of greedy doctors and tainted drug trials. The courtroom scenes are exciting even though Avery is more of an observer than a participant and her inability to forget about the dead doctor and his deceased patient shows that she is a moral person who likes to right wrongs. It will be interesting to see what her next case will be like and if she decides to go into partnership with Jake or open a practice in her hometown. Harriet Klausner