An ambitious but melodramatic courtroom tale.
A scarred man goes on trial for the death of the woman he loved in this legal thriller.
Jack Holt is standing trial for rape and murder. The victim is Maggie Navarro Stewart, a world-famous model and millionaire who was trapped in an abusive marriage to gastroenterologist Daniel Stewart. Jack and Maggie met by chance one day in a park, and she saw something in the humble warehouse worker that no one had before. Jack still bears the scars—physical and emotional—from the childhood accident that killed his father and sisters. The disfigurement to his face has mostly kept him from love—until he met Maggie, that is. Then, one day, Maggie disappeared shortly after informing Daniel she wanted a divorce. She was soon found strangled to death. Police discovered Jack’s DNA on her person, and he did not help himself by refusing to talk to them. Now, he may be facing life in prison. Jack is given a public defender, the disgraced lawyer Joe Hammer. Joe used to be a great prosecutor before he was disbarred for withholding evidence. His wife left him after the incident, and he’s since been plagued with stomach disorders and sleeping problems. Defending Jack is his shot at redemption, and he means to do it by the book. Meanwhile, a jury of conflicting personalities is assembled to rule on the case. Most are ready to convict Jack, but a few holdouts force the jury to consider the alternative. The trial will prove a roller coaster for all involved, as new facts and surprise witnesses continue to alter the shape of the case. As the trial goes on, Jack increasingly escapes into his dreams, where he and the dead Maggie discuss the events that brought them there—and whether or not he should join her in the afterlife.
Elzey makes bold choices with the novel’s structure, leaping forward and backward in time and using dream sequences to fill in much of Jack’s and Maggie’s backstories. The prose is readable, but there is a draftlike quality to it that suggests a lack of editing. Here he takes three sentences to communicate the age of one character: “When I first saw my former boss, I couldn’t believe how old he had become. The man I hadn’t seen in many years had become a withered old man. The eighty-three-year-old judge with the help of a cane stood up to greet me.” Nearly every aspect of the story displays the same heavy-handedness. The dead Maggie is idealized while Jack has a saintly disinterest in the world. Neither feels much like a real character, and their relationship will be no more believable to readers than it is to the members of the jury. Racist juror Henry Keller is a cartoon version of a bigot, taking every opportunity to offend each person he comes in contact with. The author attempts to tie up these threads in a statement about the two different Americas—one of opportunity and one of imprisonment—but it’s all a bit too soapy to make an impact.
An ambitious but melodramatic courtroom tale.Pub Date: June 10, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-73405-465-1
Page Count: 232
Publisher: Little House Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 15, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.
A woman accused of shooting her husband six times in the face refuses to speak.
"Alicia Berenson was thirty-three years old when she killed her husband. They had been married for seven years. They were both artists—Alicia was a painter, and Gabriel was a well-known fashion photographer." Michaelides' debut is narrated in the voice of psychotherapist Theo Faber, who applies for a job at the institution where Alicia is incarcerated because he's fascinated with her case and believes he will be able to get her to talk. The narration of the increasingly unrealistic events that follow is interwoven with excerpts from Alicia's diary. Ah, yes, the old interwoven diary trick. When you read Alicia's diary you'll conclude the woman could well have been a novelist instead of a painter because it contains page after page of detailed dialogue, scenes, and conversations quite unlike those in any journal you've ever seen. " 'What's the matter?' 'I can't talk about it on the phone, I need to see you.' 'It's just—I'm not sure I can make it up to Cambridge at the minute.' 'I'll come to you. This afternoon. Okay?' Something in Paul's voice made me agree without thinking about it. He sounded desperate. 'Okay. Are you sure you can't tell me about it now?' 'I'll see you later.' Paul hung up." Wouldn't all this appear in a diary as "Paul wouldn't tell me what was wrong"? An even more improbable entry is the one that pins the tail on the killer. While much of the book is clumsy, contrived, and silly, it is while reading passages of the diary that one may actually find oneself laughing out loud.
Amateurish, with a twist savvy readers will see coming from a mile away.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-30169-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A standout in the series.
The sixth adventure of Harvard symbology professor Robert Langdon explores the mysteries of human consciousness, the demonic projects of the CIA, and the city of Prague.
“Ladies and gentlemen...we are about to experience a sea change in our understanding of how the brain works, the nature of consciousness, and in fact…the very nature of reality itself.” But first—Langdon’s in love! Brown’s devoted readers first met brilliant noetic scientist Katherine Solomon in The Lost Symbol (2009); she’s back as a serious girlfriend, engaging the committed bachelor in a way not seen before. The book opens with the pair in a luxurious suite at the Four Seasons in Prague. It’s the night after Katherine has delivered the lecture quoted above, setting the theme for the novel, which features a plethora of real-life cases and anomalies that seem to support the notion that human consciousness is not localized inside the human skull. Brown’s talent for assembling research is also evident in this novel’s alter ego as a guidebook to Prague, whose history and attractions are described in great and glowing detail. Whether you appreciate or skim past the innumerable info dumps on these and other topics (Jewish folklore fans—the Golem is in the house!), it goes without saying that concision is not a goal in the Dan Brown editing process. Speaking of editing, the nearly 700-page book is dedicated to Brown’s editor, who seems to appear as a character—to put it in the italicized form used for Brownian insight, Jason Kaufman must be Jonas Faukman! A major subplot involves the theft of Katherine’s manuscript from the secure servers of Penguin Random House; the delightful Faukman continues to spout witty wisecracks even when blindfolded and hogtied. There’s no shortage of action, derring-do, explosions, high-tech torture machines, attempted and successful murders, and opportunities for split-second, last-minute escapes; good thing Langdon, this aging symbology wonk, never misses swimming his morning laps. Readers who are not already dyed-in-the-wool Langdonites may find themselves echoing the prof’s own conclusion regarding the credibility of all this paranormal hoo-ha: At some point, skepticism itself becomes irrational.
A standout in the series.Pub Date: Sept. 9, 2025
ISBN: 9780385546898
Page Count: 688
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Sept. 9, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
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