“The Hearing” by John Lescroat is a good legal thriller on par with his other novels. The center characters are Dismas Hardy, a defense attorney, and Abe Glitsky, a homicide lieutenant, who are close friends in San Francisco. The plot revolves around a heroin addict, Cole Burgess, who is found holding the gun and caught running a way from a murdered female lawyer, Elaine Wager. Elaine is Abe Glitsky’s daughter who he has never acknowledged.
Glitsky forces a confession from the Burgess while he is experiencing withdraw. After Burgess is treated for his addiction he recants his confession and starts to proclaim his innocence. Hardy is retained as Burgess’ lawyer as his mother is the wife of another friend. Initially Hardy has little doubt of Burgess’ guilt, but doesn’t believe Burgess should get the death penalty. The District Attorney, who is coming up for reelection and has been considered soft on crime, has made the case political. As Hardy and Glitsky investigate the crime they soon come to the conclusion that the homicide not just a simple mugging and maybe Burgess is not guilty of the murder after all.
I like John Lescroat’s novels as I have read a couple now. They are good legal novels with solid plots. I find Mr. Lescroat’s style of writing a little difficult to follow at times. He has a tendency to build up characters or issues and then drop them. I have a couple more of Mr. Lescroat’s novels on my bookshelf that I never got to and look forward to reading them. They are great bedtime reading.
