A precariously placed Detroit lawyer with no trial experience finds himself thrust into the courtroom defense of a billionaire client's will. When Jake Martin videotaped banker Augustus Daren's latest will, it seemed a routine precaution; despite a stroke, the old man was clearly in full possession of his faculties when he decided to vest voting control of his controlling interest in giant Hanover Square Bank in his third wife, Elizabeth, instead of splitting the power with his two children as well. But now that foreign banks are sniffing around H.S.B. hoping for a merger or a buyout, whiny Chip and cautious Gussie, despite the millions they're sure to inherit, are trying to keep control of their shares—and the fabulous power they confer—by claiming their father was incompetent at that signing. Jake, who's up for a partnership in prestigious Sperling Beekman, is confident of victory only because he doesn't know that (1) Elizabeth's neighbors in upstate Eagle County, where he plans to enter the will for probate before a jury, would love to see her lose the case; (2) Chip's insider at H.S.B. has turned the two witnesses to the signing against Jake; (3) Chip's insider at Sperling Beekman has stolen both copies of the tape; and (4) the all-star litigator who's supposed to be trying the case for Sperling Beekman is about to pull out. As Jake struggles to hold his own in the often riotous courtroom scenes, his wife is suing for divorce, luscious Elizabeth is coming on to him, and Chip's suave veteran trial lawyer T.G. (Tiger) Sage is quietly turning the local newspapers against him. Guess how it all turns out. Less assured than Shadow of a Doubt (1991) and Death Penalty (1992); the ending comes too easily despite too many unresolved subplots. But Coughlin, who died early last year, keeps you burning the midnight oil up to the very end.
Pub Date: March 25, 1993
ISBN: 0-312-08818-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1993
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
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