The Lincoln Lawyer

Man, you went to the dictionary for “oleaginous.” But I quite agree that McConaughey fills that description without going over the top.

And although Connolly’s plot in this is sometimes a bit over the top (book or movie), very surprisingly this movie does not turn into an over-the-top clichéfest. My Eyeroll Meter (patent pending) barely got a workout.

The movie was populated by good actors or good fits for parts. Bob Gunton is good as the Roulet family lawyer, Cecil Dobbs, although there isn’t much of an adversarial relationship between Haller and Dobbs as I think there is in the book.

A somewhat appropriately reptilian Frances Fisher plays Louis Roulet’s mother, Mary Windsor. Her part isn’t large but she does a lot with what she’s given. And (spoiler alert), in the book didn’t they suggest that it was Louis Roulet who had raped his mother? I’m not sure about this point but her rapist was left unnamed in the movie.

I thought the weakest characterization (by writing, not by acting) was the role of Earl, Haller’s driver. In the book(s), Earl and Haller have a lot of good back-and-forth. But Earl is left a bland and undefined character in this one, no fault at all to Laurence Mason who just isn’t given any lines.

Haller is interesting (as you know) as the ambulance-chasing lawyer whose clientele is the who's-who of Really Bad People. It's interesting to see things from the other side, to watch this slick (barely ethical) defense attorney do his stuff. Everyone deserves a fair trial. But Mickey seems to give his clients even more than that.

And when you get into this one, you might soon be thinking that, no, we ought not to defund the police. But there are probably a few precincts that need to be fumigated. I have no idea exactly who is framing Haller. It could be with the help of the police. We just don't know yet. But it's crystal clear that the prosecuting attorneys are not playing fair...to the point where I would say they are corrupt.

And so Haller is in his element as he takes on these bastards as he defends himself (with help from staff). That's tough to do when you are in lock-up, although because of his special circumstances, he's put in a special section and not with the rank-and-file. The book more or less starts out this way and you see a few things from the inside and it will redouble your pledge to never go to jail.

I was actually shocked at the logic of this book. I remember reading some of that horrible stuff set in India. Giant leaps of illogic and people doing things that made no sense.

Well, this is only a small spoiler. But while inside, Mickey was paying some big black guy four hundred a week for protection. Even in this segregated part of the jail (the black guy was in there because he was basically a snitch) you are not safe. Mickey promises this guy that if he (if both of them) get out, he needs a new driver.

Well, Mickey does eventually make bail. And the black guy (Bishop) is released and Haller finds him on his doorstep one day ready to take the driving job. Anyone reading this book is thinking, "Watch it, Mickey. He may be a plant."

And, sure enough, we later see that Haller has every intention of keeping an eye on him. He has Cisco check him out. And even after coming through squeaky clean, the reader is left with no doubt that he still could be a plant by the police.

Wow. This is nicely played by Connolly. How many idiot authors would have written Haller as having zero suspicion? So I like the realism he puts into this one.

I think we both attained Bosch-fatigue at about the same point. But I always had a soft spot for the Lincoln Lawyer series. Assuming that Connolly's research is good, it gives you courtroom procedure like I've never seen on TV.

Reading about exotic things is interesting. And seeing this ambulance-chasing lawyer use his cleverness to game the system is interesting. And Connolly gives you some new insights on just how the criminal justice system works….or often doesn't work. The scariest notion (one that is a theme) is that once the cops have eyes on you as the culprit, they fall into a tunnel vision.

The guilty deserve a fair defense. But anyone accused of a crime (especially if they are innocent) needs an ambulance-chasing lawyer like Mickey Haller. And the theme of this book soon becomes clear. Mickey (as a defense lawyer) must not just get a not-guilty verdict, for as he notes, "not guilty" is not the same as "innocent."

Getting an NG was always good enough for his clients. But if he intends to stay working as an effective lawyer, he must go all the way and prove his innocence. And that means nailing the bastards who actually did kill this one guy.



Good points. I assume Connolly's experience is picked up mainly around LA and southern California. I have no idea if he paints a balanced picture. But via these books, the bad cop seems not to be few and far between but a regularity. The system would seem to be so tainted that a good cop – such as Bosch – is automatically at odds with the system.

And as referenced in this Lincoln Lawyer book, he has indeed finally won a seven-figure settlement against the LAPD.

I still suspect in this one that his new driver, Bishop, is working for the police. I can't imagine it otherwise. If so, I think the emerging plot-point will be Haller basically turning Bishop into a double-agent and then feeding the DA what he wants them to hear. We shall see.

I finished The Law of Innocence, number six (and latest) in the Lincoln Lawyer series.

If you're into the series, I would suggest you read this one. It is entertaining enough. Read no further, then, because spoilers galore as I sift through the aftermath.

Although readable, some aspects of it seem phoned in. The first 20% is the most compelling as Haller is arrested for murder. The next 20% or so is also good as he assembles a legal team as he attempts to defend himself from jail. That includes hiring his half-brother, Harry Bosch, although Bosch is mostly volunteering.

We have some good input from Bosch in the early going. But for the rest of the book, he (and just about everyone else) is a token character. We rarely, if ever, escape the first-person view of Mickey Haller. We hear about what Bosch and his prime investigator, Cisco, are doing. But never do we advance into the field to follow them.

When Haller's co-counsel must leave to visit her sick father, his ex-wife Maggie McPherson takes a leave of absence from the prosecutor's office and volunteers as co-counsel. This sounds like a potentially warm family reconciliation but, honestly, the dialogue in this book is mostly superficial and not particularly compelling.

And Connolly can't help himself from taking cheap shots at Trump. And I do mean cheap. Connolly comes off as a sniveling little libtard here and there.

But thank goodness we also learn that: The sheriff's department is corrupt. The jail system is corrupt. The FBI is corrupt. And the prosecuting attorney is corrupt. And if "corrupt" is too strong a word in some cases, "incompetent" or "malignant" would be terms that work.

And while in jail, the sheriff's department likely tries to kill him, settling some old scores. Some of the LAPD officers likely were in on the frame-up. One of the FBI guys was going to beat the life out of Haller had his partner not intervened. Taken in full, this all seems a bit excessive. Not impossible. Just excessive.

And we never do find out if Haller's driver, Bishop, was an informant or not. In fact, there are more than a few loose ends hanging. Perhaps the biggest and most controversial decision in the plot is to basically chuck out your investment in the entire trial sequence. The reader has been enduring a particularly obnoxious (and likely corrupt) prosecuting attorney. To see her comeuppance is what we have to live for as we slog our way through the book.

But, instead, at the end, the FBI cuts a deal with the higher-ups and all charges are dropped. Whoopee. A big anti-climax, and one that can't be saved by the attempted murder of Haller by some mafia hit-man at the very end. That stolid plot point just underlined how unsatisfying the ending was. We have all that courtroom buildup basically thrown out. What was the point then?

Okay, the real world is most certainly messy like this. But I still seems a bit off. Contributing to the foul air was the backdrop of the Wuhan Flu. One can't expect Connolly to ignore this historical backdrop but it definitely is not a pleasure dealing with this stuff again.

So how was the crime committed? Someone shot one of Haller's old clients and did so apparently in the garage of his house. The presumably unconscious victim was put in the trunk of Haller's Lincoln while in his garage and then several slugs were shot into the victim, some which went through the bottom of the car and deposited blood and other evidence on the garage floor.

We never learn. The man who likely perpetrated this frame-up is himself killed by one of his mob higher-ups. Whoopee. We spend all this time putting the thread of evidence together and then it evaporates (more than once) at the last moment.

Although I found the book readable, I can't disagree with this summing-up from an Amazon review. His points are valid and fair:



The book is fundamentally flawed. Still, the character of the ambulance-chasing Haller is interesting enough to at least hold my attention. If you're invested in the series, this is one more to read. But clearly this book is phoned-in to a great extent.

It does seem that way. One reviewer at Amazon speculated that it isn't even Connolly writing these. One of my favorite sci-fi authors is Arthur C. Clarke. But in the later years (if only due to age...which is a good excuse) he started farming out the books to "co-authors." And the books were often fairly denuded because of this.

What kind of input Clarke still had, I don't know. But it could have been one of those bunco things like having Steven Spielberg as "executive producer" which often meant almost nothing. I do wonder if Connolly is relying on a team of monkeys sitting at their typewriters churning this stuff out. Certainly the book lacked artistry and distinction.