A review by crafalsk264
Stung by William Deverell

adventurous challenging informative mysterious medium-paced

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

3.75

Arthur Beaucamp (pronounced beech ‘em) is an elderly semi-retired attorney. And now he is facing some of the most challenging issues of law that he has ever encountered. Seven environmental volunteers have decided that they need to take direct action. One of the young women, Rivkie Levitsky, lures and drugs an executive with a large chemical plant by stealing his keys and passwords in order to steal confidential information about the company. To guide them in breaking into the plant and sabotaging the production . When the police capture the group in the act, they admit to the crime but plead not guilty due to necessity,  resulting in a public spectacle of their trial.

Arthur is in his late seventies and technically considers himself retired but he is usually trying 1 or 2 high profile cases for the firm. He agrees to take on their case because he is sympathetic to their environmental cases because he and his wife are working to get an endangered parcel added to a local park. He also has a wolf hound pup he is trying to train. His wife is still a member of parliament and travels frequently leaving him to deal with all the details of running a household.

This is a legal thriller complete with tense courtroom scenes with jury deliberations that are several days in duration. Although this is compared to John Grisham and James Patterson, this is much more of a character driven story than the usual novels. It is the 8th book in the Arthur Beaucamp series. I very much enjoyed this book and plan to look for some of the of the earlier ones in the series. The characters were well drawn and even though there are  a lot of characters. They aren’t difficult to keep separated. We have three narrators: Arthur Beaucamp, Rivkie Levitsky and a detective of police. The book is long (21+ hrs audio) but I couldn’t really find anything that I would recommend to cut. Recommend to readers of legal thrillers, bees, ecoterrorists and  courtroom drama.