I figured it was time to post my first non-catch-up review (hooray me!). So here goes…
The Lincoln
5 stars
Well, this was my first Michael Connelly book and I must say I was more than impressed. I don’t normally go for this kind of pop-fiction paperback stuff. I mean, sure, I have a few stand-by authors that I are always good for a fun thrilling read, but I don’t put too much stock in the genre itself. And I definitely don’t give these books 5 stars! Call me snooty, but it’s probably all of the classics that I’ve been reading as of late. But I noticed that one of my trusted friends on Shelfari had read this one recently and gave it an excellent review. With that in mind, and the neato trailers I saw for the movie coming out soon starring Matthew McConaughey (yes I say neato, what’s your point?), I figured I’d give it a go.
It was excellent. A legal thriller if there ever was one. Mickey Haller is a defense attorney who has kind of lost his way. He has two ex-wives and looks at a client for the dollar signs and the publicity. He’s always been afraid of having a truly innocent client and he thinks that he might have finally found one in rich boy client, Louis Roulet, who has been accused of brutally attacking a woman in her apartment. Instead, Haller comes to find out what he really should have been afraid of all along is meeting someone who was truly evil. Of course he realizes all of this too late as his life gets totally turned upside down as he tries to still be the best defense attorney he can be while setting things right…somehow.
It all sounds very cliché but Connelly stages everything impeccably. You see both sides of the legal system and how Haller is struggling to stay afloat in it all. And then the thrills come at you and just when you think you’ve gotten it all figured out you get smacked right in the side of the face. It’s intense. It’s over 400 pages but once I got through the first 150 pages I didn’t want to put it down. I had to force myself to go to sleep one night and shut the book. I’m very excited because it seems I’ve found myself another go-to pop-fiction author in Michael Connelly (and I wasn’t even looking for one!). Excited for the movie now as well, more than before.
