9/10
Another post about the Mickey Haller series; this time is the book I read first, although it’s the second entrant to the series (confused yet?). It’s also the first time that Harry Bosch and Haller both appear in a book together (as far as I can tell anyway), but more on that later.
I’d argue that The Brass Verdict is even better than The Lincoln Lawyer, although both suffer from the problem that you don’t need to read them in order to understand the series as a whole. The Brass Verdict gives plenty enough information about the happenings in the previous installment to make it almost a standalone novel, which sort of cheapens the effect of writing a series. Instead of being able to just start the plot of this novel, several chapters are devoted to bringing the reader up-to-date about what happened previously – and for the record, I also hate this on TV shows, because I’ve been binging this show for hours and require no recap – skip, skip, skip!
But back to the point: I liked this book a little better than The Lincoln Lawyer. Part of this stems from the fact that The Brass Verdict is at its heart a come back story, which I found more compelling than the previous plot, which had been all about making a ton of money on a sensationalized case. Haller, after events in The Lincoln Lawyer, had taken time off (I’m being incredibly vague on purpose, I promise). And in Verdict, he’s taking the Lincolns out of the garage, dusting off the briefcase, and getting back in the game. This is not to say the the plot is any slower-paced, but the plot builds to the climax in a more linear way, rather than slamming into you in the form of a plot twist or sudden death – although there are still exciting plot twists. And while Verdict had no side clients (which was an interesting part of Lincoln Lawyer, since it made the story more realistic and complex that there were multiple clients at any given time and even was an important part of the climax and resolution of the novel), the decrease in clients made the side characters pop more – and as a Lorna Taylor fan, I approve. (Side note – I find Connelley’s treatment of women in both novels so far to be admirable – plenty of differences in the female characters, very little focus on attractiveness or appearances, little reliance on stereotypes). Anyway: Taylor and Cisco shone in this novel, and I enjoyed their contributions as manager and investigator, and how Connelly’s law practice is very much a team effort (which was present in Lincoln Lawyer, but not to the same extent).
The major client in this case was sleazy, but in a good way: it made the trial and case interesting, and even jury selection was intriguing legal maneuvering – which was not quite true in book one. I also enjoyed the “Hollywood Mogul” plot more than the realtor plotlines of Lincoln; who doesn’t love a book with some movie stars, especially set in Los Angeles?
I also really liked the title – much more creative and clever than naming the novels after a car, but I won’t say much more in fear of spoilers.
As to any problems – my biggest one is Bosch. I’ve read a few of the Bosch novels, and while I probably won’t get around to reviewing the, but I don’t find them nearly as good as the Lincoln Lawyer series (although I love courtroom drama more than police drama, so that’s likely just my own bias). And while Detective Bosch shows up in later Haller novels, his introduction in this series was lackluster at best. I hadn’t read anything about him prior to reading the Verdict, and so didn’t know anything about the character. But the expectation definitely felt like I should already know who he is, what he’s about, and where his arc was going. I will jump ahead and say the Haller/Bosch collab was much better in book 3: The Reversal, but that’s a story for another time – in The Brass Verdict, Bosch felt like one of the weakest parts of the story.
Overall, a very satisfying read, and I’ve already mentioned that I liked it enough to read The Reversal – look for that review sometime in the future!
Cheese Can Read? 