If the rising thermometer has you searching for relief, there's one sure-fire way to cool down: with a few spine-tingling chills from a skilled thriller writer.

This month brings new novels from blockbuster suspense authors James Lee Burke and Lisa Scottoline. Their books have two things in common: lawyer protagonists and plots that boast more twists and turns than a mountain pass.

Today we offer our critics' assessments: Are they hot or cold about these latest sizzlers?

In the Moon of Red Ponies

By James Lee Burke (Simon & Schuster, $24.95)

Plot in a nutshell: Ex-Texas Ranger Billy Bob Holland has moved his family to Missoula, Mont., where he's opened a law practice. When his old nemesis Wyatt Dixon is released from prison on a legal technicality, Holland knows trouble is just around the corner. Wyatt Dixon claims to have found God, and he seems to be taking his meds, but this is the man who buried Holland's wife alive for a day, and Billy Bob doesn't trust him. Holland is also dealing with a client named Johnny American Horse, an Indian-rights activist. A couple of hit men make the mistake of trying to attack Johnny and end up disfigured by Johnny's knife and hatchet - and Johnny is convinced it's the government that's trying to kill him. When he marries the daughter of a senator and some potentially incriminating documents are stolen from a truly evil man name Mabus, Johnny has to take it on the run. Meanwhile, with his family being threatened by Mabus - with the apparent backing of the government - Holland has no idea whom to trust or how to protect them and Johnny from such a threat. Holland is driven, once again, to take the law into his own hands- with morally twisted results. Moment that most convinced me the main character really knows the law: none Worst snippet of dialogue: Page 1. This is, after all, James Lee Burke. They don't come any better. Hottest character: Karsten Mabus, the incredibly wealthy and twisted entrepreneur rumored to have sold chemical weapons to Saddam, and who seems to have most of the politicians in Montana in his pocket. Overall temperature of the book: Peter Mergendahl Mary DiNunzio, a young Philadelphia lawyer, is suing for reparations on behalf of the estate of Amadeo Brandolini, an Italian-American who committed suicide while being held in a Montana internment camp during World War II. The problem is that all but one government document related to Brandolini's stay in big-sky country are missing. Without more facts about his internment, DiNunzio doesn't have a case. Undeterred, she takes the few physical clues she has - a lock of hair, some old doodles, Brandolini's wallet - and starts investigating. What she finds leads to more questions than answers: Why was the FBI monitoring Brandolini? Why is his official cause of death listed as asphyxiation when he supposedly hanged himself? How did Giovanni Saracone, Brandolini's friend from the internment camp, make millions with no known source of income? And why is a mysterious black Escalade following DiNunzio around? When her office is ransacked and a fellow lawyer is murdered, DiNunzio comes to the realization that someone doesn't want her to uncover the truth. Moment that most convinced me the main character really knows the law: Every time she breaks the law she's allegedly sworn to uphold. Consider the time DiNunzio breaks into a fellow lawyer's office and steals confidential files. From there she trespasses onto Saracone's gated estate, barricading herself in the dying man's bedroom and accusing him of murder. She then goes back to his mansion the day he's buried and impersonates a funeral planner to gain access to the home. Inside, she ransacks his office and steals more documents. A few days later, she serves Saracone's son with legal papers and, on her way out the door, punches him in the face. Oh, and then she's dumb enough to admit just about all of this to the police. Worst snippet of dialogue: : When Frank Cavuto, the lawyer who gave DiNunzio the Bandolini case, is murdered more than a quarter of the way through. I still had no idea whodunit but couldn't wait to find out. Hottest character: Giovanni's son, Justin. The first time DiNunzio meets him, he spits on her and then punches her in the face. That could explain why she smacks him back a few days later. Overall temperature of the book: Karen Algeo Krizman.

Most defining characteristic of main character: Holland accidentally killed his partner in a shootout with drug mules on the Mexican border. Now Holland speaks to his partner's ghost, who shows up from time to time with advice.

When Holland describes being a lawyer this way: "Every defense attorney has clients who enter his life on a seemingly temporary basis, then become the human equivalent of chewing gum on the bottom of a shoe. . . . The average practitioner of criminal law has a clientele with whom he does not want to be seen in public."

Moment I wondered whether this character has ever seen the inside of a courthouse: none

Best snippet of dialogue: Here the evil Wyatt Dixon addresses Billy Bob Holland:

"Ain't many I can talk to. Ain't many gonna understand. But you and me share the same kind of upbringing. You growed up in a church where the preacher preached hell so hot you could feel the fire climbing up through the floor. It was a three-ring circus, with folks speaking in tongues, drinking poisons, sticking their hands in a boxful of snakes. Tell me I'm wrong."

"You're wrong," I lied.

"A penny for your thoughts," she said.

"The country is turning into a toilet," he replied.

"It's not that bad, is it?"

"I guess not," he said.

Moment when I knew I had to finish the rest of the book:Number of times I felt burned by the book: Once. A deputy sheriff is tortured to death, in part by electric shock to his genitals. But when the body is found later, a microcassette recorder the deputy had taped to his thigh is still there. Wouldn't the killers have seen it if they'd taken off his clothes to torture him?

Johnny American Horse. A former Special Forces soldier with a physique to match the job, he's an idealist who's smart enough to not be sentimental about those ideals.

Coldest character: Line most guaranteed to give you a chill: "That night, while we slept, someone cinched a vinyl garbage bag over the head of my buckskin gelding and let him run himself to death in the darkness."

99 degrees. Burke's characters are fascinating in all their hubris and moral failings, his descriptive powers are first-rate, and the plot will keep you turning pages relentlessly. This is one of the best books you'll read this year.

Killer Smile

By Lisa Scottoline (HarperCollins, $25.95).

Plot in a nutshell:Most defining characteristic of main character: DiNunzio's husband was murdered and she's still grieving. Now she's stuck in the past and fated to go on one bad blind date after another - including the occasion when she mistakes a man sent to murder her as her latest suitor.

Can't think of one. Her actions sometimes make you wonder whether she even knows right from wrong. Read on.

Moment I wondered whether this character has ever seen the inside of a courthouse:Best snippet of dialogue:

Mary DiNunzio to the widow, Mrs. Nyquist:.

"You must miss your husband."

"Every minute," Mrs. Nyquist sighed. "You know, they say everything happens for a reason, but I'm not sure I believe that anymore" . . .

"So, then, what do you believe in, Mary?" Mrs. Nyquist waited expectantly, and all of a sudden, Mary knew the answer. She had realized it, sitting in a dark farmhouse, with a very kind stranger, in the middle of Montana.

"I believe in justice. And in love. And in not getting over it, because that's too much to ask of a human being....Getting over it is the wrong thing to want, anyway... the best you can hope is to live past it. And you go on. Your past becomes a part of you, you just fold it into the gnocchi dough and keep rolling."

"So this was a beet field. Tell me -"

"You keep sayin' beet field. It's a sugar beet field."

"I stand corrected," Mary was flunking Montana. "Sugar beet."

"Ever seen a sugar beet? . . . "It looks like a big fat carrot, only white."

"Does it taste good?"

"You can't eat sugar beets, city girl."

"Why not? I eat beets. They come in cans, from Harvard. They're geniuses. Genius beets."

Moment when I knew I had to finish the rest of the bookNumber of times I felt burned by the book: None. Despite DiNunzio's many faults and illegal actions, the plot speeds along so that you hardly notice the negatives.

DiNunzio's lawyer friend, Judy. Not only does she help solve the Bandolini case, but she has legal-pad yellow hair and wears tie-dyed T-shirts, baggy jeans and yellow clogs that look like bananas to the office. As Mary says, she's "business casual meets Cirque du Soleil."

Coldest character: Line most guaranteed to give you a chill: "The dangerous ones, the truly murderous ones, lie in wait. And then, when the moment's right, they strike."

At a comfortable 85 degrees, Killer Smile isn't a superhot thriller. But it's a fun, easy read for summer.

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