description: Best-selling author Michael Connelly, whose character-driven literary mysteries have earned him a wide following, breaks from the gate in the over-crowded field of legal thrillers and leaves every other contender from Grisham to Turow in the dust with this tightly plotted, brilliantly paced, impossible-to-put-down novel.Criminal defense attorney Mickey Haller's father was a legendary lawyer whose clients included gangster Mickey Cohen (in a nice twist, Cohen's gun, given to Dad then bequeathed to his son, plays a key role in the plot). But Dad also passed on an important piece of advice that's especially relevant when Mickey takes the case of a wealthy Los Angeles realtor accused of attempted murder: "The scariest client a lawyer will ever have is an innocent client. Because if you [screw] up and he goes to prison, it'll scar you for life."Louis Roulet, Mickey's "franchise client" (so-called because he's able and willing to pay whatever his defense costs) seems to be the one his father warned him against, as well as being a few rungs higher on the socio-economic ladder than the drug dealers, homeboys, and motorcycle thugs who comprise Mickey's regular case load. But as the holes in Roulet's story tear Mickey's theory of the case to shreds, his thoughts turn more to Jesus Menendez, a former client convicted of a similar crime who's now languishing in San Quentin. Connelly tellingly delineates the code of legal ethics Mickey lives by: "It didn't matter...whether the defendant 'did it' or not. What mattered was the evidence against him--the proof--and if and how it could be neutralized. My job was to bury the proof, to color the proof a shade of gray. Gray was the color of reasonable doubt." But by the time his client goes to trial, Mickey's feeling a few very reasonable doubts of his own.While Mickey's courtroom pyrotechnics dazzle, his behind-the-scenes machinations and manipulations are even more incendiary in this taut, gripping novel, which showcases all of Connelly's literary gifts. There's not an excess sentence or padded paragraph in it--what there is, happily, is a character who, like Harry Bosch, deserves a franchise series of his own. --Jane Adams
language: English
title: The Lincoln Lawyer
titlecomplete: The Lincoln Lawyer (The Lincoln Lawyer, #1; Harry Bosch Universe, #15)
characters: Mickey Haller Jr., Detective Lankford, Cecil Dobbs, Teddy Vogel, Hayley Haller, Mickey Mantle (The Lincoln Lawyer), Dwayne Jeffery Corliss, Regina Campo, Martha Renteria, Fernando Valenzuela, Melissa Menkoff, Louis Roulet, Charles Talbot, Ted Minton, Robert Blake (The Lincoln Lawyer), Sammy Davis Jr. (The Lincoln Lawyer), Deputy Meehan, Frederic Bentley, O.J. (The Lincoln Lawyer), Edward Turner and Ronald Atkins, Sirhan Sirhan (The Lincoln Lawyer), Darius McGinley, Francis Ford Coppola (The Lincoln Lawyer), Heidi Sobel, Mickey Cohen (Beverly Hills Dead), David Lambkin, Sam Scales, Robert Gillen, Mary Alice Windsor, Harold Casey, Mr. X (The Lincoln Lawyer), Lorna Taylor, Raul Levin, Martin Booker, Gloria Dayton, Howard Kurlen, Leslie Faire, Connie Fullbright, Houdini (The Lincoln Lawyer), Margaret McPherson, Officers Maxwell and Santos, Arthur Metz, Earl Briggs, Jesus Menendez
genres: Suspense, Audiobook, Mystery, Fiction, Legal Thriller, Thriller, Crime, Adult, Mystery Thriller, Detective
ratings_count: 229116
places: Los Angeles, California, Hollywood, California
series: The Lincoln Lawyer, Harry Bosch Universe
awards: awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Macavity Award
category: Best Mystery Novel, awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Anthony Award
category: Best Novel, awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Shamus Award
category: Best PI Hardcover, awardedAt: 1136102400000
name: Edgar Award
category: Best Novel
publisher: Orion (UK)