The Past Never Ends

"... a fast-paced read that pulls together into a surprising ending." -- 5-star review from Open Book Society

"Jackson Burnett’s legal mystery, The Past Never Ends, provides a compelling whodunit while exploring the pursuit of justice. Penned in the tradition of Erle Stanley Gardner or Scott Turow, the story is set where the Old South meets the New West. For the reader who seeks the new but understands the new is really old, or who enjoys a touch of noir, this is the book."
-- Jackie King, author of The Inconvenient Corpse

A simple task, Attorney Chester Morgan thinks. Get a copy of a public record for a young man whose only friend has died in an unexplained accidental death. Except...

The police file regarding the demise of sex worker Tanya Everly has been sealed by the order of the chief of police, and no one will talk. Warned to drop the matter, Attorney Morgan knows that if he doesn't speak for the dead young woman, no one will.

Haunted by his discovery of the body of a prominent local oilman, Morgan pursues a quest for justice that puts his reputation, career, and life at risk. A journey that takes him into the dark shadows of the sex-for-sale business, into the marble courtrooms of Oklahoma, and into the aching loneliness of his own soul.

Set in the American Southwest in the days before 9/11, The Past Never Ends is both a complex murder mystery and a meditation on the self-perpetuating nature of injustice and the ethereal nature of justice itself.