Rocketgirl's Full Review: Phillip Margolin - Ties That Bind
Yes, that's what he claims. He didn't murder the former senator. And when he killed the attorney that came to see him in jail it was in self-defense, not in cold blood. It seemed an open and shut case to the prosecution though. The jailer supposedly saw everything. Lawyer Amanda Jaffe is asked by the judge to handle the pimp's case. Though the thought of defending someone who is probably guilty is abhorent to her, she takes on the case as a favor to the judge who is a friend of her father.
The story is told from the prospective of several different characters. Despite what the cover art would lead you to believe, Amanda Jaffe is not the lead character in this story. She and her father ARE returning characters though. However, I felt she was kind of force fit into this story. The defense attorney could have been anyone.
Instead, assistant district attorney Tim Kerrigan is the lead character. He will prosecute Jon Dupree. Because it seems an open and shut case to him, his, nor the author Phillip Margolin's, attention is really on the case. Instead it is on this exotic call girl that comes into his courtroom one day. She gets him in bed, for which he feels tremendous guilt toward his family, but at the same time is unable to help himself. Until one day, she threatens blackmail if he does not release Dupree.
So this story is told from the viewpoints of Amanda, Tim, the call girl, and the ultimate bad guy. Eventually all the stories intersect, and that is the point of the title. Is that they all have a tie to each other and eventually the reader finds out what that is. It is a clever plot device, but for some reason, in this case did not quite come off. It seemed far too coincidental. Especially by throwing in a character from a previous book.
Because of the lack of imagination here, I can only rate this book average. The solution of the story was only average and very unoriginal. The coming together of the different story lines was predictable and ordinary.
As far as writing style, I do like Margolin's style. He doesn't waste alot of unnecessary prose on events that have nothing to do with the plot. He doesn't waste descriptions on scenes and events but gets to the point. The dialogue is believable and not stilted. The characters seem real, especially Tim Kerrigan. You can easily feel the panic he feels when the call girl starts to blackmail him. There is no profanity, no sexual innuendo, and very little violence, despite the fact that people have been killed.
It is a very readable book despite its plotting flaws. There is enough substance to it and the author has evoked enough sympathy for Tim's character that you want to keep reading to find out what happens to him. Even though Amanda Jaffe is the returning character I guess the reader is supposed to be cheering for, being a female lead, an attorney, etc., but I just didn't seem to connect with her character in this particular story. Perhaps another book in the series will be better.
On the outside, Amanda Jaffe has healed from the traumatic events that concluded Wild Justice, but inside, she's struggling to regain her self-assuran...More at Audible.com
On the outside, Amanda Jaffe has healed from the traumatic events that concluded Wild Justice, but inside, she's struggling to regain her self-assuran...More at Audible.com
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