Split Screen by Lee Goldberg
is the seventh installment of this thriller series. It opens with Homicide
Detective Eve Ronin of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department out running
solo because her partner, Duncan Pavone, is desk bound. He is going to be there
on his desk in the Lost Hill substation for the foreseeable future as the
powers that be are still pondering his fate. Detective Eve Ronin is feeling a
ton of guilt as he is taking the very public fall for a decision they both made
a few months ago. So, she is responding solo to the home of actress Juliette
Winter who was found dead that morning in her sprawling home in a gated
community in Calabasas.
A predictable and tragic end for the
former child star who became known for drugs and partying more than anything
she accomplished in front of the camera. Her assistant found her in the steam room.
Clearly, she had been there for quite some time before discovery. That same assistant,
Georgina Sabella, had last seen her around 7 the evening before when she left.
According to Ronin’s fellow LASD
Deputies manning the perimeter, the house was locked and the security alarm was
on when Georgina arrived earlier that morning. The firefighters that responded
to the initial call had also reported that the steam room door was not locked
and that the door was unblocked.
Ronin went up to the second-floor steam
room and found Medical Examiner Emilia Lopez and the head of Crime Scene Unit, Nan
Baker, assessing the body and the scene. With Juliette Winter’s history, it
would be very easy to assume she just overdosed and died.
But, did she really?
That is just one of the questions Ronin
has to answer while also dealing with departmental politics and pressure. Her
celebrity status continues to dog her career. The last thing she ever wanted was
for the publicity to overshadow her actual work doing the job. So, she tried
very hard to keep considerable distance between herself and the job and the very
fictional tv series based on her.
That plan is out the window now as there
is a new sheriff in town. Sheriff Waylon Gifford is well known for coming in and
taking over a law enforcement agency for a year or too, improving the image of
that agency, and then leaving for a bigger and more prestigious job. He took
over the LASD, the biggest in the nation, two weeks ago and has a very preconceived
notion of who she is, how she got to her position, and what she has done in the
department.
He demands that Detective Eve Ronin use
her celebrity status to help the department and has several expectations of how
she will do that. Not only does she have to participate in the new ad campaign,
she also has to actively participate in the department’s active social media. She
has to participate a certain number of times a day, every day. She also has to
conduct a week-long ride along with the actress, Erin Casey, who plays her on
the show and participate in their social media videos as well. Otherwise, there
will be huge consequences for herself as well as her partner, Duncan Pavone.
If that was not enough, she has to deal
with the hatred and death threats coming from within the department. While that
has always happened, it had died back some, until recent events stirred
everything back up again. At least she can still count on Duncan Pavone and a
few others who see her for what she actually is and still have her back.
And there is the Juliette Winter case to
solve as well as some other crimes.
The result is another fast paced and
highly entertaining read in this great series. The author has steadily built,
book after book, a complicated primary character, and a host of interesting
secondary characters while still delivering on a heady mix of action, mystery,
and suspense. The latest read, Split Screen, fits that mandate
and delivers from start to finish.
As the author notes at the front of the
book, a reader can safely start here, if they wish. But, if you intend to read
the second book in the series, Bone Canyon, you absolutely should read that one
first as there are huge spoilers for it in Split Screen.
Strongly Recommended.
Amazon Associate Purchase Link: https://amzn.to/3S9emlp
Entire Series Associate Purchase Link: https://amzn.to/447nfP7
Kevin R. Tipple ©2026
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