History Literature / TwoKindsOfTruth

Harry Bosch, now 67 years old, is still working as a part-time investigator at the tiny little police department in San Fernando, California. Bosch is looking over a fifteen-year-old cold case, the disappearance of young mother Esme Tavares, when he receives a visit from his old partner Lucia Soto and deputy DA Alex Kennedy. They inform Harry that the DA's office has re-opened an old murder case, the Preston Borders investigation. Back in 1988, Harry helped put away Borders for murder. The only problem is that a recent DNA test has revealed DNA on the victim's clothing that matches another man, serial rapist Lucas Olmer, who is now dead. Bosch faces the prospect of professional humiliation and, worse, vulnerability to a lawsuit if he can't prove that Borders really is guilty. He winds up hiring his half-brother Literature/MickeyHaller to defend him in court.

Meanwhile, Harry gets called out to a double murder at a San Fernando pharmacy. Jose Esquivela Senior and Junior, father-and-son pharmacists, were both shot to death at their place of business. Bosch's investigation leads to a criminal conspiracy involving "pill mills" that process fake prescriptions for opioids, and the organized crime rings that make millions selling the pills to addicts. Bosch must go on a dangerous undercover mission to find the truth while at the same time clearing his name in the Preston Borders affair.

Harry Bosch, now 67 years old, is still working as a part-time investigator at the tiny little San Fernando, CA police department. Bosch is looking over a 15-year-old cold case, the disappearance of young mother Esme Tavares, when he receives a visit from his old partner Lucia Soto and deputy DA Alex Kennedy. They inform Harry that the DA's office has re-opened an old murder case, the Preston Borders investigation. Back in 1988 Harry helped put away Borders for murder. The only problem is that a recent DNA test has revealed DNA on the victim's clothing that matches another man, serial rapist Lucas Olmer, who is now dead. Bosch faces the prospect of professional humiliation and, worse, vulnerability to a lawsuit if he can't prove that Borders really is guilty. He winds up hiring his brother Literature/MickeyHaller to defend him in court.

* TheBusCameBack: Jerry Edgar, Bosch's partner for the first several novels in the series, makes his first appearance in a Connelly novel since ''Literature/TheOverlook'' in 2007. Edgar has come back into law enforcement, and now works for the Medical Board of California, and helps Bosch learn about the illegal trafficking of prescription opiods.
* CallingOutForNotCalling: Madeline flips out when her dad goes a weekend without answering her calls. She was afraid that he'd done something to himself over the looming threat of the Borders case, while in fact Harry was on an extremely dangerous undercover mission.,

* DeceasedFallGuyGambit: Part of the plan to get Preston Borders out of prison consists on framing the now deceased rapist Lucas Olmer for Borders' crime and accusing the now deceased lawyer who represented Borders of making up the lie told during the original trial because no jury back then would believe a cop would forge evidence. Harry is given an opportunity to dodge the frame up charges by accusing Frankie Sheehan [[AvertedTrope but he refuses]]. Borders' original lawyer turns out to be alive.

* FakingTheDead: It turns out that Mickey Haller's elderly mentor David "Legal" Siegel had his own obituary published several years ago to discourage vengeful ex-clients from looking for him.

* HonorBeforeReason: When Jose Esquivel Jr. found out that his father was running a "pill mill" operation in cahoots with TheMafiya, Jose Jr. went to the police. This got both of the Esquivels brutally murdered just a few days later.

* {{Irony}}: Lampshaded by Jerry Edgar: the illegal activity Jose Esquivela, Sr., participated in is probably where the money came from to put Jose Esquivela, Jr., through pharmacy school.
* TheMafiya: The Esquivelas were killed because of the father's involvement with "a Russian-Armenian syndicate." Esquivela Sr. was filling bogus prescriptions for pills that the Russian mobsters then sold.
* MyGreatestFailure: Subverted hard by Siegel. He points out to Bosch that Borders was his only client in 49 years to end up on death row. then he adds:

* PoorCommunicationKills: It almost did. Harry didn't tell his lawyer that he was going on an undercover mission, so Mickey chooses that weekend to plant a story about the Borders case in the newspaper, one that has Harry's picture. The bad guys see it and decide to kill Harry, but he kills them instead.

* ReportsOfMyDeathWereGreatlyExaggerated: Near the end of the novel Esme Taveras shows up very much alive. She skipped out on a bad marriage fifteen years before, abandoning a baby daughter in the process, and has been living under an assumed name. Bosch and the rest of the San Fernando PD, who spent a lot of money and manpower looking for her, are very upset.
* RippedFromTheHeadlines: A minor and completely coincidental case, but the back story of murder victim Danielle includes the fact that as an up-and-coming actress in Hollywood, she had had to deal with sexual harassment from directors, producers, and the like. Connelly could not have known that the Harvey Weinstein scandal and the ensuing #metoo movement were going to break on October 5, 3 weeks or so before this book's publishing date.
* RussianRoulette: The Russian mobster says "You know I am Russian, yes?", then forces Harry to play a game of Russian roulette. Luckily for Harry the DEA modified his revolver so that it can't fire.

* WhatTheHellHero: Harry delivers one of these to Mickey Haller after finding out that it was Haller who leaked the story to the LA ''Times'' that blew Harry's cover and nearly got him killed. A pissed-off Haller shoots back that it won them the case, and he didn't know that Harry was undercover because Harry didn't tell him.

* RealityEnsues: Harry, now 67, stays up late to read a case file, then spends a full day investigating a double homicide, then is a passenger for a long-ish car trip back to headquarters, during which he dozes off for half an hour.

* INeverSaidItWasPoison: Terence Spencer tries to avoid a subpoena by telling the person delivering it he doesn't know a "Terry Spencer" but she points out she only called him "Mr. Spencer".

* TakeThat: From what's starting to become a pattern, Connelly (through Bsoch) takes yet another swipe at President Donald Trump, specifically about the rumoured Russian collusion.

** Who was Preston Borders' lawyer at trial? Irascible old David "Legal" Siegel, now retired, previously seen in the Literature/MickeyHaller novel ''Literature/TheGodsOfGuilt'' as Haller's friend and sort-of mentor. Also, Judge Houghton, the judge who presides over the habeas hearing for Borders, was the judge at the [=LaCosse=] murder trial in ''The Gods of Guilt''.

* {{Defictionalization}}: Zig-zagged in-universe; it's revealed that ''Film/TheLincolnLawyer'' was a nonfiction docudrama and Creator/MatthewMcConaughey had not approached Literature/MickeyHaller about a sequel just yet.

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!!Tropes:

* WhatYouAreInTheDark: Harry could have easily divert blame to his fellow investigator Frankie Sheehan since the latter is no longer alive but he refuses.

Harry Bosch, now 67 years old, is still working as a part-time investigator at the tiny little San Fernando, CA police department. Bosch is looking over a 15-year-old cold case, the disappearance of young mother Esme Tavares, when he receives a visit from his old partner Lucia Soto and deputy DA Alex Kennedy. They inform Harry that the DA's office has re-opened an old murder case, the Preston Borders investigation. Back in 1988 Harry helped put away Borders for murder. The only problem is that a recent DNA test has revealed DNA on the victim's clothing that matches another man, serial rapist Lucas Olmer, who is now dead. Bosch faces the prospect of professional humiliation and, worse, vulnerability to a lawsuit if he can't prove that Borders really is guilty.

** Who was Preston Borders' lawyer at trial? Irascible old David "Legal" Siegel, now retired, previously seen in the Literature/MickeyHaller novel ''Literature/TheGodsOfGuilt'' as Haller's friend and sort-of mentor.