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Summary
Summary
In this electrifying legal thriller, public defender Sybylla Muldoon unwittingly encounters a massive and malignant conspiracy when her client, a homeless man, is accused of stabbing a child on a New York street. With its timely, terrifying premise and its strong, engaging female protagonist, this novel breaks breaks fresh ground in the area of fictional law.
Author Notes
Jean Hanff Korelitz was born and raised in New York City and graduated from Dartmouth College and Clare College, Cambridge. She is the author of the novels A Jury of Her Peers, The White Rose and Admission, as well as Interference Powder, a novel for middle grade readers, and The Properties of Breath, a collection of poetry. Her newest novel, You Should Have Known, made the New York Times bestseller list. A film version of Admission starring Tina Fey, Paul Rudd and Lily Tomlin was released in March 2013.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
This fast-moving legal thriller, an accomplished first novel, follows New York City Legal Aid lawyer Sybylla Muldoon as she prepares to defend a once-gentle homeless man named Trent who has been arrested for the brutal stabbing of an Upper East Side schoolgirl. Initially, Trent manifests classic signs of schizophrenia, but he soon becomes coherent and, while intimating a tale of abduction, refuses to speak more fully until his trial. As Koreliltz traces Sybylla's approach to this high-profile case, she reveals the day-to-day workings of modern justice as played out in New York City's crowded courtrooms at 100 Centre Street. Utterly commited to her clients, Sybylla, a postfeminist Nancy Drew, exhibits a thinking woman's appeal that is heightened by both her difficult relationship with her father, a noted right-leaning jurist who may soon become a Supreme Court nominee, and a developing romantic interest. Although the plot, featuring murder, conspiracy, politics and the perversion of justice, moves into Robin Cook territory for a time, Korelitz's convincing characterization, vigorous prose and rapid-fire pacing deliver thoughtful entertainment along with the promised thrills. (Apr.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
A monstrous-conspiracy wolf in legal-intrigue clothing. Despite rejection by her legal-eagle father, Sybylla Muldoon has never had any second thoughts about her job as a Manhattan public defender. But now, as she prepares her defense of a street person known only as Trent, she's tested more sorely than ever. Four witnesses saw Trent attack Amanda Barrett without provocation as she got off her school bus, slashing Amanda's face and belly but leaving her alive to testify along with all the others. The only defense is insanity--an obvious defense to anybody who's dealt with the patently schizophrenic Trent--but Trent won't let Sybylla plead him insane, and a mysterious implant the doctors at Bellevue removed from his underarm holds out a slim hope for another defense, even as Trent, sans implant, seems to recover miraculously from his delusions and is pronounced competent to stand trial. But the old friend Sybylla asks to put the implant through its pharmacological paces is murdered, the implant disappears, and the trial commences with only Sam Larkin, Legal Aid's dishy newest member, on Sybylla's side. Fans of courtroom drama will be rubbing their hands in anticipation by this point, but first-novelist Korelitz throws a curveball right by them, bringing the trial to a brusquely unexpected end and unveiling a deep-dyed conspiracy that links Dermot Muldoon, now conveniently nominated to the Supreme Court; his old crony Robert Winston, a trial consultant with a uniquely holistic approach to jury selection; Trent himself; and who knows how many other homeless New Yorkers. It would be unkind to give away any more of the plot, but it's fair to warn that Korelitz's clever, unbelievable conspiracy makes her novel more schizoid than Trent himself. The wild improbabilities allow a stinging critique of the jury system that lifts this above other conspiracy novels to some kind of prophetic truth. Paging Oliver Stone.
Booklist Review
Resourceful public defender Sybylla Muldoon exposes an insidious plot involving kidnapping, radical drug experimentation, and jury tampering that extends from a grubby New York courtroom to the hallowed halls of the U.S. Supreme Court. In order to exonerate her client, a homeless man accused of an utterly heinous and seemingly random assault on a young child, Sybylla begins investigating his dubious claim that he was abducted and held against his will in a strange hospital. When she discovers that the baffling implant removed from his upper arm is actually a time-release device loaded with LSD, Sybylla prepares to use this explosive information in her defense argument. Before she is able to present this evidence in court, her client conveniently dies, and she realizes her own life is in grave jeopardy. Fleeing to Washington, D.C., Sybylla uncovers evidence linking her own father, a popular Supreme Court nominee, to the bizarre conspiracy. A suspenseful and tautly rendered legal drama. --Margaret Flanagan