ALBERT’S TIME

Bookman’s novel follows a beleaguered defense attorney and his client, who faces a potential death sentence.

Attorney Simon Koufax and his colleague Morgan Stoddard (“Morg” to his friends) are on a fishing trip deep in the Canadian wilderness. Though they haven’t caught anything yet, their trip is cut short when their home office in Philadelphia calls with an urgent request: The boss wants Simon to take on the case of one Albert Shoemaker Birdsong, a man accused of murdering both hedge fund manager Malcolm Hawthorne and a 12-year-old boy. Recently separated from his wife and not terribly close with his own college-age son, Simon takes the case with no small amount of pride at having been asked to do so. Fourteen months later, Albert is convicted of the crime, of which he is “overwhelmingly” guilty, according to Simon himself. All that’s left now is to determine whether the sentence will be death or life without the possibility of parole. As the jury deliberates this question, Bookman takes readers back through the steps of the case and trial, revealing the motivations that drive (or inhibit) Simon; past cases alternately drag him down or spur him on. Fans of courtroom dramas may find that the author moves somewhat slowly in some stretches as he explains the ins and outs of the legal wranglings, but otherwise this novel moves swiftly—an impressive achievement, given that readers know much of the ending before the story really opens up. Bookman, an attorney himself, provides compelling details that feel gleaned from his professional experience: “Juries love judges. They especially loved the Honorable Maxine Boray Lorenz. She was sitting on high in an immense red leather chair, and she treated the jurors as if they were in fact her jurors, prized possessions who had to be protected from miscreant attorneys trying to lead them astray.” Self-reflective attorneys are nothing new in fiction, but Bookman delivers a memorable entry in a well-trodden genre.

An affecting story that explores the ways in which lawyers and clients carry each other’s burdens.