BLINDSIDE

A sailor seeking solace while in the throes of a separation gets the ride of his life when his bedmate proves to be a trashy novelist who uses him as material, spurring the Navy to get on its moral high-horse: a true-grit follow-up to Lane’s Duty (1999).

A bar, a pat on the knee, a weekend of sex . . . it didn’t amount to much in the career of officer Neal Olen, 44, who transcended that rough patch in his marriage, became a hero for saving the life of a boy who fell overboard, and retired to a second career as a consultant for a weapons contractor. Unfortunately, though, his weekend becomes chapter six of Navy Wench, and when author Angela Vance lets slip that someone much like Neal was the model for the male character, the reaction from on high is swift. Given the possibility of security breaches, his clearances are yanked and Neal immediately loses his consulting job, but, more than that, he’s recalled to active duty in order to face a court-martial for adultery and conduct unbecoming. Hiring an ace attorney who revels in cases like his—they give her a chance to avenge those former colleagues who hounded her out of the service for being gay—Neal wins a pretrial hearing only to have the judge’s ruling overturned and the trial proceed. An unauthorized meeting with Angela brings him face-to-face with her enraged ex (to whom she was married when she dallied with Neal), who puts him in the hospital. A further adventure—a shootout that gets the ex killed—persuades Neal to live up to his code of honor and put himself at the mercy of the jury of his peers.

Using his background as a 20-year Navy legal-eagle, Lane adds perfectly credible soul-searching to create an honest and heartfelt courtroom drama of agenda-driven military intransigence at odds with personal integrity.