DAY OF WRATH

by William J. Coughlin ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 4, 1980

Coughlin's The Stalking Man (1979) was exploitation psycho-violence at its lowest--but here his insider's feel for big-city courthouse action (in a Detroit-like metropolis) gives some genuine texture to the crude melodramatics. The city courts are in a mess: the logjam of cases keeps some prisoners (guilty or innocent) behind bars for over a year before trial; and the newspapers are about to make muckraking hay of the situation. So the powers-that-be order State Supreme Court Justice James (""the King"") Tingle to break up the jam--he's the state's leading black jurist, a whipsmart, overweight giant with three mistresses, a fondness for rich foods and big cigars. . . and gambling debts of about a hundred grand. No wonder, then, that King is eager to undertake the courthouse cleanup (a festival of bribes)--and he cleverly appoints an unpopular, bumbling judge to do the dirty work and be the unknowing fall guy: King sits behind him and begins processing 20 cases an hour (three minutes of pleabargaining per lawyer), with major offenders going virtually scot-free in a revolving-door filmflam that bypasses trial-by-jury. Meanwhile, however, two top members of the biracial World Liberation Army have been arrested for murder during a bank robbery, and the WLA is now mounting a zealous plan to free them. Armed with grenades and automatic weapons, four WLA fanatics grab the state's twelve leading judges (including King Tingle) as hostages, demanding the killer's release, a B-52 bomber, and $3 million. This terrorism is strictly standard issue, and the deus ex machina climax throws reality out the window. But as long as Coughlin (a former prosecutor, now a judge) sticks to the grimly believable courthouse shenanigans, he serves up zesty characters and grittily authentic backgrounds. So: vigorously effective melodrama that only goes astray when it lapses into that overworked hostage formula.

Pub Date: Aug. 4, 1980

ISBN: 1568494092

Page Count: -

Publisher: Delacorte

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1980

Categories: FICTION