Good in parts.My feelings towards this book oscillated as I read it. I'm not a fan of courtroom narratives and found the beginning quite dull as we spent much of our time in the court. As things heated up, with more activity out in the real world, so did my enthusiasm. Unfortunately I was disappointed with the end which fell a bit flat, so only three stars overall.(Please excuse spelling errors as I listened to the unabridged audiobook and so may have some names wrong.)Nina Reilly is a likeable lawyer, efficient and determined. Her client, Stephan Wyatt, has been arrested for digging up the bones of a dead Russian, Constantin Zhukovsky, for $1,000. Stephan is the 'Unlucky' character of the title, as he discovered a dead body in the soil above the coffin and is subsequently arrested for the murder of Zhukovsky's daughter, Christina. Nina is defending him with little background research as the case has not been adequately prepared before her arrival (annoying/rather unbelievable). Her boyfriend, Paul, is a private investigator who works for the same firm and he helps unravel the explanation for Christina's death.The story also centres around death of the last Tsar of Russia, Nicholas II, and his family nearly 100 years earlier. What happened to the two family members who were not accounted for at the time? This is an era that I had been intending to look into and so I found this aspect of the narrative fascinating.Well read by Laural Merlington, I'm glad I listened to this rather than reading it. Recommended as an audiobook, reservations as a straight read.
I enjoyed it after I got into it. I would like to give it a 3.5-3.7. I'm getting more and more frustrated at having to choose between 3 and 4 and 4 and 5.What took this down under a 4 for me, and may keep me from reading any more by the author(s) is that I was neutral toward the main character. She was too difficult, relentlessly ambivalent. Ambivalence done well can make characters compelling. But they have to break the bonds of ambivalence and decide to do something, however much they might wish not to. Nina just let things happen until the decisions were pretty much made for her.The mystery is pretty interesting and fun to try to figure out. The legal issues were done well and realistically. The courtroom tactics and reflections before choosing them are well done.
What do You think about Unlucky In Law (2005)?
MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS:I had liked "Acts of Malice," but this fell short for me.It's a case of lawyer Nina Reilly going to trial to defend a murder victime, before she has all the research done. Nice bits of writing here and there, but I didn't feel the momentum, the crescendo throughout. New evidence, theories keep emerging during the trial, which should make the reader anxious, but somehow it didn't all build to the suspenseful peak I would hope and expect.Nina's out of her Tahoe habitat - returned to California, where she grew up, to be near her love interest, Paul Waggoner, and to help out the law firm where she'd interned.Several clever plots and sub-plots -- a "house of Romanov" descendant may be alive; there's curious bloodwork that arises from a bone marrow transplant; a cemetery grave desecration takes place; Nina's former mentor -- who's technically the lead defense attorney at trial -- is on the verge of incompetence due to advancing age.The mystery all comes down, in the end, to a greedy art-loving partner in the firm (who did the murder, kept Romanov treasure; tries to shoot Nina).The trial's developments alternate w. developments in the relationship between Nina and Paul (who did the killing to save Nina in "Acts of Malice"). I don't know if that's what interfered w. the story's pacing. But Nina's constantly putting off Paul annoyed me as much as it did him.
—J
