The basic plot is standard for all death row stories -- innocent man is convicted because of police tunnel vision/evidence manipulation. Smart young lawyer, young honest cop or other naive fresh face uncovers the truth and saves the inmate (or in the stronger stories, uncovers the truth and the client is executed nonetheless). Bernhardt set his story up well -- he paints the picture of a horrific crime, and he shows us the trial testimony of the prosecution's star witness. But, after that, it was all downhill. Bernhardt's characters were too stereotypical, the investigation body count way too high, and his random lashing out at fast-food corporations too out in left field. The story was overly-complex in unnecessary ways, and far too straight-forward in others. For fiction involving the death penalty, I would instead recommend Stephen King's The Green Mile and Richard North Patterson's Conviction. For true crime involving the death penalty, nothing beats Truman Capote's In Cold Blood. I have also started Norman Mailer's The Executioner's Song, as well as John Grisham's The Innocent Man. Both are quite promising so far, and bound to tell a much better story and make a much stronger and more honest statement about the death penalty than this one.
I did really enjoy this book, but with reservations. I almost quit reading because the beginning of the book was really somewhat gratuitously gruesome and disturbing. I would definitely have quit had I not read previous books by this author. As it turned out, one detail of the violence in the book did turn out not to be gratuitous and a definite plot element. One reason I kept going is the likeability of the main recurring characters, Ben Kincaid and his partner Christina as well as other members of his office staff and friends. Were it not for this, I think I would have quit.
What do You think about Death Row (2004)?
In Death Row, a food flavorist was sentenced for killing and torturing a family in the most gruesome way possible. Ben Kincaid was the defense lawyer in the case, but he couldn’t prevent his client from being sentenced to death row. The incriminating testimony came from the 15 year old girl who survived the massacre. Seven years later, the girl comes forward and admits that her testimony was coerced by the DA. Before she can testify, she is found dead of an apparent suicide, but Kincaid suspects foul play. This makes Kincaid and the detective originally on the case search for the real killer.This was a fairly disappointing novel. The writing felt flat at times, and there was a general lack of believability in the plot. I had a hard time buying who the actual killer was and their motivation. It takes a lot not just to kill people but to torture them as well, and I wasn’t buying what the author was selling. This is not a book worth reading. I would recommend skipping this one.Carl Alves – author of Blood Street
—Carl Alves
