A sufficient legal tale augmented by a meticulous examination of the accused.
In this thriller, a Texas lawyer comes to the aid of a war veteran who’s on trial for murder.
Reporter David Lewis, a double amputee since a street battle in Iraq, is pleasantly surprised by his run-in with Cordelia Lehrer. The two, who’d had a one-night stand in college, quickly reignite their intimacy. But there may be more to the reunion: Cordelia invites David to meet her father, Kingston, the prosperous owner of KL Media Group and its 50 daily newspapers. It’s apparent Daddy wants an heir, callously referring to his other married daughters as “barren.” David certainly fits the bill, with expertise in the operation of newspapers, and he and Cordelia are soon married and expecting. Just a couple of years later, however, David needs an attorney. He’s shot someone dead, or at least he thinks so, because he blacked out before seeing the lifeless body. He hires Donnie Ray Cuinn, and shortly thereafter, cops, doubting David’s claim of an accident, charge him with murder. Aware that the district attorney has David’s reputed motive, Donnie hopes a jury will believe the veteran truly suffers from PTSD. Though this is Donnie’s fourth appearance in Taylor’s (The Monkey House, 2015, etc.) series, he’s only in the novel’s latter half. The first half is David’s engrossing first-person narration, as he’s slowly drawn into the Lehrer family. There’s mystery even before the murder, like Cordelia’s agenda: is the marriage for love or merely a business deal to produce an heir? Much of Donnie’s part involves questioning witnesses on the stand during the trial. The story turns into a courtroom drama, less gripping than David’s account but sporting rapid-fire dialogue exchanges from both the prosecutor’s side and Donnie’s. And while there’s little room for exploring Donnie’s personal life, his prior relationship with the DA makes for tense scenes in court. Taylor stamps his novel with a doozy of an ending.
A sufficient legal tale augmented by a meticulous examination of the accused.Pub Date: Oct. 31, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-9894707-3-5
Page Count: 262
Publisher: Katherine Brown Press
Review Posted Online: Nov. 11, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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