When the governor of the state of Washington asks him to investigate a snuff film found on her grandson's phone, J. P. Beaumont, no stranger to human depravity, is shocked by this horrific crime and discovers that this murder has much wider implications.

"Lean forward, grab on, and ride for adventure." So says Library Journal of J.A. Jance's last J.P. Beaumont mystery, Without Due Process. Now Jance's veteran police sleuth is back in Failure to Appear, tracking an insanely clever killer through the well-heeled world of actors, stage folk, and arts patrons. Beaumont doesn't exactly have a simple life, solving murders as one of the Rainy City's finest, staying sober one day at a time, and dealing with...

Investigations into the murders of Officer "Gentle Ben" Weston's and his family divulges the truth behind his involvement with gangs.

As a flash from the past, the daughter of his first partner Milton Gurkey (Pickles) shows up, and Beaumont relives his rookie days. While in the midst of suffering a heart attack, Pickles stumbled into a crime in progress. In the end, a woman is dead, Pickles is unconscious, holding the murder weapon, and rookie Beaumont and his cop friends must find out the truth.

The dead woman was an artist recently arrived from Washington State, cruelly cut down in the early stages of a promising career. Now all that remains of Rochelle Baxter lies on a cold slab in the Cochise County morgue, and Sheriff Joanna Brady knows that murder has once again infected her small desert community. But there is more to this homicide than initially meets the eye -- and more to the victim, who died while supposedly under the conscientious...

"Before he retired, J.P. Beaumont had looked forward to having his days all to himself. But too much free time doesn't suit a man used to brushing close to danger. When his longtime nemesis, retired Seattle crime reporter Maxwell Cole, dies in whats officially deemed to be an accidental fire, Beau is astonished to be dragged into the investigation at the request of none other than the deceased victim himself. In the process Beau learns that just because...

Beaumont is taking some time off to get knee replacement surgery, but instead of taking his mind off work the operation plunges him into one of the most perplexing mysteries he's ever faced. His past collides with his present, explore the staggering cost of war and the debts we owe those who served in the Vietnam War, and those in uniform today.

Big-city homicide detective J.P. Beaumont and small-town sheriff/mom Joanna Brady join forces once again to solve a case involving a series of murders--six young women wrapped in tarps, doused with gasoline, and set on fire; and one elderly caretaker run over and left to die.

"Years ago, when he was a homicide detective with the Seattle PD, J.P. Beaumont's partner, Sue Danielson, was murdered. Volatile and angry, Danielson's ex-husband came after her in her home and, with nowhere else to turn, Jared, Sue's teenage son, frantically called Beau for help. As Beau rushed to the scene, he urged Jared to grab his younger brother and flee the house. In the end, Beaumont's plea and Jared's quick action saved the two boys from...

Life has shifted for J.P. Beaumont. After a tragic accident that devastated and ultimately disbanded his Special Homicide Investigation Team, he accepts that he has left homicide detection behind at this point, but he has a lot of unanticipated free time on his hands. He's keeping busy with renovations on the new house that he and his wife, Mel Soames, the newly appointed chief of police in Bellingham, Washington, have bought. But new fixtures and...