Reviews

The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly

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leannaaker's review against another edition

5.0

As far as suspense fiction goes, Connolly is great! This is the first one of his books I have read, and I will be reading more. This book is about a defense lawyer who defends the worst of the slime. He is worried he won't "know innocence when he sees it." There are a number of twists in the case he is defending for a wealthy young man accused of sexual assault. I really enjoyed this book.

afox98's review against another edition

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4.0

Mickey Haller is a defense attorney who operates out of his Lincoln for ease of mobility in getting to his various clients in the courthouses, jails, and prisons he's in and out of all the time. He's doing his usual routine when a client falls in his lap that he thinks could be a "franchise" case - one that brings in the big bucks. Louis Roulet is accused of assaulting a prostitute and Haller thinks it's going to be a fairly easy case to defend. But when someone close to him is murdered, he realizes there is more to this case than he first realized. Supported by his two ex-wives, Haller digs further into his client's past and realizes quickly there are some cracks in his client's story. Before he knows it, he's fighting for his own life.

Many legal thrillers can be dry and get bogged down in courtroom details and one-dimensional characters. This book had rich character development, not only with Haller, but the side characters and how they interact with him. An interesting plot with realistic twists, this had the right mix of legal procedure, suspense, and action. Looking forward to reading more in the series.

dorothy_gale's review against another edition

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5.0

YESSSSSSSS! This is my kind of book! I can totally see why this was made into a movie, and I'm glad I didn't see the movie so I can watch it now. I love a legal thriller that makes you think and keeps you guessing. I will definitely be reading more from this author.

ermt520's review

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mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

space_and_sorcery's review against another edition

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adventurous informative mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

In my recent discovery of the works of Michael Connelly, through his Harry Bosch series, I became acquainted with his other successful saga featuring defense lawyer Mickey Haller: just like it happened with Bosch, I “met” Haller first in his cinematic version with the movie The Lincoln Lawyer and then through the more recent Netflix series with the same title. Jumping from screen to book was indeed a given for me, and the narrative links between the two book series made me often think of another successful TV show, Law and Order, with Bosch representing the “Law” side of the story and Haller taking the “Order” role through the intriguing courtroom scenes which are the backbone of the story and that appeal to me even more than police procedurals.

Mickey Haller is a defense attorney nicknamed “The Lincoln Lawyer” because he prefers to do all his work aboard a Lincoln Town Car, while his driver shuttles him all over Los Angeles between the courtrooms and the prisons - yes because Mickey’s clientele mostly comes from the lower strata of society: biker gangs, small-time offenders, prostitutes and so on. He’s well-known in those circles for being the kind of lawyer who often manages to acquit his clients, or when that doesn’t work, to get them a reduced sentence. He works with quantity rather than quality, and is always looking for the “coup” that might present him with some financial stability, which he sorely needs given that he has two ex-wives - one of them a prosecutor he often meets while touring courtrooms and the other presently working as his case manager - and a hillside house with a great view, which he’s still paying for.

So, when one of his many contacts presents him with the potential for a “franchise client”, the kind of client who promises steady income over the years, he does not look too closely into this proverbial gift horse’s mouth, hardly wondering why affluent Louis Roulet wanted someone like Haller to defend him against the accusation of having savagely beaten a prostitute. Roulet looks and sounds innocent - something of a change given Haller’s usual clientele - but some inconsistencies in the course of the investigation compel the lawyer to look closely at the evidence and bring him to a devastating discovery, one that forces him to navigate the extremely narrow margin between his commitment as an attorney and his conscience.

By now I know that Michael Connelly’s writing never fails to engage me, but with this novel I was even more intrigued than usual, to the point that I did something I rarely - if ever - do: I read the first three books in the series back to back, and I not only avoided any kind of “story fatigue”, but I ended up feeling eager to continue with the series. Hook, line and sinker, indeed… What I found fascinating, besides the story itself, is the dichotomy between Haller’s outwardly sleazy persona and his own ethics, a divide that creates a multi-faceted, quite humanly believable character. He is a man very focused on his work and somehow haunted by the ghost of his father, a famous lawyer whose professional shadow he keenly feels, even though the man died when Mickey was still a child.

I’m indulging in a little spoiler here, because it’s not a major one: Haller and Bosch are half brothers from that father’s side (something that I already knew thanks to my searches about Connelly’s works, and that is revealed in the second novel), and it’s interesting here to look for the two men’s points of contact and differences - despite the opposing sides of the law in which they work, they are both quite committed to their profession, to the point that both of them have sacrificed emotional entanglements to pursue that drive, but where Bosch is his very own man, forced from early childhood to depend only on himself, Haller often feels the weight of that larger-than-life father and the unconscious need to be “worthy” of his legacy. In the end, both men are striving for justice, each in his own different way and through totally different means, and I’m certain that the juxtaposition of these two characters will offer many intriguing considerations down the road.

In this first Lincoln Lawyer novel, Michael Connelly fuses very successfully characterization and plot, creating an engrossing story that quite deserves the title of “page turner”: once again I came to the written word after experiencing the plot through the cinematic medium, and yet I was never bored or distracted by that knowledge because this is the kind of writer who knows how to capture his audience’s attention and keep it riveted from start to finish. Here the mix of courtroom debate, police investigation and unexpected twists and turns takes the readers through a story that is more than a simple legal thriller because it also explores, very compellingly, the nooks and crannies of the human soul while it showcases the intricacies of the legal system in a way that is everything but pedantic.

It’s true that my TBR hardly needed another book series to weigh it down, but this new addition promises to offer many hours of absorbing reading, so I will not complain…. ;-)

lakecake's review against another edition

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4.0

Mickey Haller is the type of main character you hate to love, but you can't help yourself. He's a semi-sleazy defense lawyer, who turns out to be a pretty ok guy. The story is a slow burner...it takes a lot of build-up and detail, and then all of the sudden it just blows up. Excellent read.