An extraordinary hero stars in a legal tale as believable as it is riveting.
In this 15th installment of a thriller series, a Miami lawyer takes a stance against football after a high school player’s alarming injury.
As a former Miami Dolphins linebacker, attorney Jake Lassiter knows how dangerous football can be. All that contact on the field left him with chronic traumatic encephalopathy, and he suffers the constant pounding of migraines and tinnitus. He also has problems with his memory and can’t recall coaxing his friend and old Dolphins teammate Langston “Tank” Pittman to forge his own wife’s name on a consent form—allowing the couple’s teen son, Rodrigo, to play football. So when Rod is seriously hurt during a game’s kickoff and may never walk again, guilt practically crushes Lassiter, the boy’s de facto uncle. The lawyer vows to “abolish” football, though he’s really after a temporary ban until the Florida High School Athletic Association declares the sport safe. He has barely filed suit (against the school’s coach and the FHSAA) when he gets a taste of the hostile defiance he was anticipating. The Consortium, a supposed organization of high-profile companies, aims to protect high school football, as a legal action against it also threatens the billion-dollar NCAA and NFL. But Lassiter has a solid case for “coaching malpractice,” from the coach keeping an unmistakably disoriented Rod in the game to the man running illegal pit drills during team practice. Unfortunately, the defense attorneys play dirty, as Lassiter suspects they’ve got people following, tracking, and wiretapping him. It’s sure to be a white-knuckled fight if Lassiter wants a win in the courtroom.
In this series outing, Levine’s recurring protagonist proves sublimely complex. He’s a whip-smart lawyer whose painful bouts with merciless CTE earn him sympathy. But he’s not always a purely ethical professional; as Rod’s mom rightly points out, Lassiter pursues this case more for himself than for the injured teen and his family. The rest of the cast is also strong—loyal pal Tank is the opposite of his wife, who blames Lassiter for their son’s tragedy, while the FHSAA’s attorney Sandra Day is a formidable and possibly unscrupulous opponent. The author fuels this legal thriller with an impressive pace, showing that a deceptively simple “wack-a-doodle lawsuit” can churn out endless surprises and bumps in the road. Lassiter, for example, digs up evidence from a TV news program—with the help of a skilled hacker—and from a crucial item that someone’s been keeping. The attorney is moreover up against the defense’s questionable evidence; an offer that looks an awful lot like a bribe; and strangers creeping around his property. Meanwhile, understated humor brightens the novel courtesy of Lassiter’s charming quips (even in court). But random citizens’ periodic tweets provide the biggest laughs; they’re rife with assumptions, sarcasm, and amusing spellings (“I heard Lassiter is dying. Well, I say good writtens”). The ending courtroom battle sears with intense and realistic turns, as at least one of Lassiter’s smoking guns unexpectedly fizzles. It all builds to an unforgettable closing scene.
An extraordinary hero stars in a legal tale as believable as it is riveting.Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-73450-569-6
Page Count: 417
Publisher: Herald Square Publishing
Review Posted Online: Oct. 13, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.
Two killers are on the loose. Can they be stopped?
In this ambitious mystery, the prolific and popular King tells the story of a serial murderer who pledges, in a note to Buckeye City police, to kill “13 innocents and 1 guilty,” in order, we eventually learn, to avenge the death of a man who was framed and convicted for possession of child pornography and then killed in prison. At the same time, the author weaves in the efforts of another would-be murderer, a member of a violently abortion-opposing church who has been stalking a popular feminist author and women’s rights activist on a publicity tour. To tell these twin tales of murders done and intended, King summons some familiar characters, including private investigator Holly Gibney, whom readers may recall from previous novels. Gibney is enlisted to help Buckeye City police detective Izzy Jaynes try to identify and stop the serial killer, who has been murdering random unlucky citizens with chilling efficiency. She’s also been hired as a bodyguard for author and activist Kate McKay and her young assistant. The author succeeds in grabbing the reader’s interest and holding it throughout this page-turning tale of terror, which reads like a big-screen thriller. The action is well paced, the settings are vividly drawn, and King’s choice to focus on the real and deadly dangers of extremist thought is admirable. But the book is hamstrung by cliched characters, hackneyed dialogue (both spoken and internal), and motives that feel both convoluted and overly simplistic. King shines brightest when he gets to the heart of our darkest fears and desires, but here the dangers seem a bit cerebral. In his warning letter to the police, the serial killer wonders if his cryptic rationale to murder will make sense to others, concluding, “It does to me, and that is enough.” Is it enough? In another writer’s work, it might not be, but in King’s skilled hands, it probably is.
Even when King is not at his best, he’s still good.Pub Date: May 27, 2025
ISBN: 9781668089330
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Scribner
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
As the prosecutor sadly observes: “All this because of a dead buffalo.”
Idyllic Catalina Island turns out to be just as crime infested as the rest of Los Angeles County in the latest series launch by the creator of Harry Bosch, Renée Ballard, and the Lincoln Lawyer.
Det. Sgt. Stilwell has been bounced off the county homicide squad and rusticized to Catalina, where the exclusive Black Marlin Club won’t admit even four-term Avalon Mayor Doug Allen to full membership and the most serious infraction seems to be the killing and cutting up of a buffalo, presumably by Henry Gaston, who operates Island Mystery Tours when he’s not threatening endangered species. All that changes with the discovery of a body sunk in the surrounding waters. The corpse, most recognizable by its streak of purple hair, is that of Leigh-Anne Moss, a Black Marlin server recently fired for fraternizing with members and guests she sees as potential sugar daddies. Stilwell is sufficiently invested in her murder to compete vigorously over jurisdiction with Rex Ahearn, the LA County homicide detective who kept his job when Stilwell lost his. Their rivalry, fueled by mutual contempt, is only the first hint that Stilwell will end up fighting his counterparts in law enforcement and local government at least as hard as he fights crooks like hit man Merris Spivak and Oscar “Baby Head” Terranova, Henry’s boss, who comes under sharper scrutiny when Henry disappears and ends up dead himself. Connelly handles his hero’s obligatory romance with assistant harbormaster Tash Dano and his increasingly wary alliance with assistant D.A. Monika Juarez with equal professionalism, and if the wrap-up leaves some loose ends dangling, well, that’s what franchises are for.
As the prosecutor sadly observes: “All this because of a dead buffalo.”Pub Date: May 20, 2025
ISBN: 9780316588485
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: April 19, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2025
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