Silent Counsel: A Novel Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)Legal thrillers are not my standard reading fare, but I grabbed this book to take with me on a five-day vacation. The book lasted 24 hours and I lost a night's sleep -- without regret! There are enough reviews online that explain the plot; what impressed me was how Ken Issacson seemed to care about the reader's intelligence. When literary contrivance and conceit work skillfully in the background of a novel, rather than stepping forwarding and embarrassing both page and author, the reader relaxes quickly into the set-up. That's a skill Mr. Issacson possesses. Now, make the novel a legal thriller that's an absolute page-turner, populated with everyday people you might bump into in Manhattan or Northern or Central New Jersey. Add to it character and place delineaton that is brief--yet concise--and imaginative enough for someone who's never been to the East coast to visualize it clearly, as well as those locals who know these characters by rote and who will feel as though they are lunching with old friends. Then, add a plot that could happen any day of the week (and has!), and you're suddenly facing a runaway, unstoppable object that has you frozen in its path. For good measure, make it the author's debut novel and give him credit for explaining enough of the law to help us understand without being pedantic, and that adds up to "Silent Counsel". I don't know Ken Issacson, but he's created, amongst others, two living and breathing characters pitted against each other: a vulnerable lawyer with his privates in a vice, and a grieving mother-from-hell whose desperation is believable, empathic and, at times, despicable. The symmetry in the book is not only plausible, but almost a character unto itself; the structure of the book makes one look at how sometimes life can be building blocks stacked on top of one another creating detours which lead to designs we've never dreamed of. Do I recommend "Silent Counsel"? Absolutely! And I await a second book from this very unassuming writer who knows how to engage a reader without insulting their intelligence.

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