Beyond Suspicion

July 29, 2002
Grippando might not be the most lapidary of legal thriller writers, but he certainly has the imagination and research skills to plot up a storm. Readers of his seventh book (after A King's Ransom) will find themselves riveted as Miami criminal lawyer Jack Swyteck—the hero of Grippando's first thriller, The Pardon—returns to discover himself and his family under attack from several corners. Jessie Merrill, a particularly hot old flame of Jack's who's now dying of ALS, has hired him in an unusual civil case involving a "viatical settlement," in which she sells an insurance policy in return for an immediate cash payment. But the doctors were wrong: Jessie isn't dying, and the shadowy consortium of Russian mobsters who bought her policy are now suing to get their money back. Jack and Jessie win the case; Jack realizes that he and the Russians have been scammed; and when a principal character turns up dead in the Swyteck bathtub, Jack's unstable wife—soon joined by a vengeful prosecutor—thinks Jack did the dirty deed. There's also a tough and dangerous young Cuban woman with reasons of her own for wanting the Russians brought down, a likable roughneck whom Jack once rescued from death row, and enough mean-spirited federal agents and prosecutors to settle a career's worth of scores for a lawyer-turned-writer like Grippando, who was a partner in Janet Reno's firm before he took up the quill.

High-profile lawyer Jack Swyteck returns in this follow-up to the author's bestselling title, THE PARDON. Unfortunately, this offering is not equal to its predecessor. Though it begins with a clever twist and a lot of promise, it soon sputters into predictability. L.J. Ganser seems to sense this because his reading lacks the creative sparkle he's often shown before. When a client and former girlfriend is found dead--in the lawyer's bathtub, no less--Swyteck sets out to clear his name before he's charged with murder. The only real surprise in this plot comes with the climax, when, appropriately, Ganser ratchets up his performance. A.L.H. (c) AudioFile 2003, Portland, Maine

May 15, 2002
All Jack wants is a simple law practice away from the tensions of being the son of Florida's former governor. But when a client tricks him and then ends up dead, Jack has to act.

Copyright 2002 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.