Damage Control: Book summary and reviews of Damage Control by Denise Hamilton

Damage Control Summary

Critically acclaimed author Denise Hamilton weaves an engrossing story of teenage friendship and adult betrayal, featuring a high-powered crisis consultant who gets swept up in murder and scandal involving a wealthy political family.

Maggie Silver is solidly middle class, with a mortgage to pay and an ill mother to support. She is doing her best to scramble up the ladder at an elite PR firm in Southern California whose clients include movie stars and famous athletes. Now, Maggie tackles her toughest client yet: Senator Henry Paxton, a distinguished statesman who also happens to be the father of Anabelle, Maggie's estranged best friend from high school.

Senator Paxton's young female aide has been found murdered, and Maggie must run damage control to prevent the scandal from growing. Thrown back into the Paxtons' glamorous world, Maggie is unexpectedly flooded with memories from the stormy years in high school when her friendship with Anabelle was dramatically severed after a tragedy that neither of them has been able to forget. As Maggie gets further embroiled in the lives of the Paxtons, she realizes that the ties of her old friendship are stronger than she thinks.

Riveting and suspense-filled, Damage Control examines our craving for celebrity and spectacle, and how far the bonds of friendship can stretch before they break forever.

Damage Control Reviews

"Starred Review. [An] excellent stand-alone...The suspenseful denouement should please Hamilton fans." - Publishers Weekly

"A riveting stand-alone thriller.... In a novel that marries celebrity culture, surf noir and the bonds of friendship, Hamilton is at the top of her game." - Kirkus

"Starred Review. Her characters are believable, her plots draw on conflicts of class and identity, and her portrayal of the less-than-glamorous side of Southern California is compelling." - Library Journal

"Hamilton provides an appealingly fallible protagonist, a keen sense of place, and a little romance and, although her plot has more twists and turns than Mulholland Drive, keeps the adrenaline pumping to the final pages." - Booklist

"Denise Hamilton scores her largest and greatest triumph: Damage Control is a great mystery, and, much more rarely, a superb psychological thriller. Kudos to this brilliant talent." - James Ellroy

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Denise Hamilton Author Biography

Denise Hamilton writes the nationally bestselling Eve Diamond crime novels, featuring a reporter who solves murders in contemporary multicultural Los Angeles. Her books have been shortlisted for the Edgar, Macavity, Anthony and Willa Cather awards. Her debut The Jasmine Trade was also a finalist for the prestigious Creasey Dagger Award given by the UK Crime Writers Assn. Hamilton's books have been BookSense 76 picks and Mystery Guild alternate selections, and have been published in France, Japan and England.

As a journalist, Hamilton’s work has appeared in Wired, Cosmopolitan, Der Spiegel and New Times. She has won first place awards from the Los Angeles Press Club for feature and business writing. She lives in a Los Angeles suburb with her husband and...

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