Review: Good start for a wonderful series
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 01 11, 2012
You have to love a defense lawyer who follows the prosecutor's opening statement with a short one of his own: "Your Honor. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury. She didn't do it."The jury laughs. The prosecutor is demolished. He's lost them before the murder trial even begins. Steve Winslow's client sits in a daze. Her lawyer is a failed actor who looks like a hippie and made a living driving a cab, until he bluffed her rich uncle into a $25,000 retainer.The facts, as he knows them, point to his client as the murderer, but with his new-found wealth he hires a trusted detective to dig up background information no matter where the search leads. While all that goes on, Winslow sits in the courtroom wondering what to do next.This book is funny as all get out, but its real charm is that it makes perfect sense. Steve Winslow is an actor and understands the theatrical realities of a trial. He dances on a high wire with the agility and instincts of a performer. He picks up his moves from expressions on the faces of the prosecution, the jurors, the witnesses, the judge, and he doesn't miss a trick. As a trial lawyer he may be inexperienced but he's a dazzler and he gets results. In the end, Winslow figures out the who-dunnit and the why-dunnit, although not in time to prevent a tragedy.Parnell Hall, writing as JP Hailey, published THE BAXTER TRUST in 1988, and made it available as an e-book in 2011. It's a good beginning to this wonderful series.