THE GUILTY PLEA

On the night before the start of his high profile divorce trial multi-millionaire Terrance Wyler is found dead and it’s no accident. He’s been stabbed seven times while his four year old son is asleep upstairs. When his ex-wife shows up later at her lawyer’s office with a bloody knife, it looks like an open and shut case; but looks can be deceptive.

Robert Rotenberg’s second novel is a taut and grimly authentic legal thriller that keeps its readers guessing until the very end. He juggles ongoing police investigation, the attempts of the defence and prosecution teams to build their respective cases and the messy private lives of his cast of well rounded characters with considerable skill.

The success of writers like John Grisham means there is seldom a shortage of lawyers who fancy turning to (fictional) crime; few though manage the transition quite as stylishly as Robert Rotenberg has done. He writes about the painstaking business of putting together a legal case without losing his readers in a thicket of obscure terminology and is at pains to show that even the sharpest of legal eagles are also fallible human beings.

The Canadian setting makes for a welcome change from the usual backdrop to legal thrillers and allows him to play on subtle cultural differences whilst keeping the theatrical element that readers enjoy. This is a sound second novel from a writer who could, on the form he shows here, become one of the big names in the genre.