Oct 30 2008
Books: The Tenth Case
When we meet criminal defense attorney Harrison J. Walker–known as “Jaywalker”–he has just been suspended from practice for three years. He has a stellar acquittal rate, and is highly regarded for a guy who gets bad guys off, but he has bent the rules too far and too many times, so some sort of sanction was in order. He has been allowed to finish out the most pressing of his pending cases, of which, Samara Tannenbaum’s–the tenth–will be the most challenging. Samara (”young, petite, and sexy as hell”–go figure!) is accused of murdering her much older billionaire husband after taking out a term life insurance policy on him. She says she didn’t do it. Then she says she was framed. And, truly, there isn’t much else here.
The biggest problem with The Tenth Case (Joseph Teller) is that it tells rather than shows, the first lesson we learn in writing (and no pun intended). Most legal and detective thrillers develop from a pretty basic premise, but the good ones are marked by memorable characters, tight plot twists, the ability of the author to build tension–or, ideally, all of the above. Teller formulated a character with a good backstory in Jaywalker, but then proceeded to “tell readers what happened”, instead of allowing it to happen to us or with us and the characters. Teller is a veteran DEA agent and criminal defense attorney, so he knows his subject matter. His second book is due out in 2009; it will be interesting to see if he will have found a way to let his characters walk the walk…
