Wrongful Death: A Novel (Lisa Drew Books)

From Publishers Weekly Kerr is a medical malpractice lawyer who spent a year in The Hague observing Bosnian war crimes trials. At first glance, he might be trying to cram too much of his own experience into his second thriller (after 1999's Harmful Intent), but everything winds up fitting together beautifully in this strong and very moving tale. Lawyer Elliot Stone, grieving the sudden death of his wife and fed up with defending railroad clients against the claims of accident victims, needs a career and life change. He takes a job with the War Crimes Tribunal, falls in love with a beautiful and funny Dutch/Indonesian taphonomist (a specialist in the analysis of biological remains) named Quierin and comes home to Colorado after two years, in hopes of getting a judgeship. Instead, he lets his friend Dr. Hans Leitneran expert medical witness known as Dr. God because of his skill in convincing juriestalk him into becoming a conservator in a complicated case involving a man severely brain-damaged in a train accident, who is also accused of attacking his wife, June, and putting her into an irreversible coma. The book's climax is a superbly rendered trial sequence, in which Stone and June's gutsy college-age daughter fight for June's rights against a team of heavyweights that includes Dr. Leitner. Without stretching a point or missing a beat, Kerr manages to show how the evils done in places like Bosnia can mirror the actions of people thousands of miles away. It's an impressive performance and a stunning, inspiring read. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. From Library Journal In his second novel, Kerr (Harmful Intent) presents an intricately entwined plot, with many different story lines being told at the same time. This is first and foremost a medical and legal thriller about a comatose woman, June Stillwell, who is eventually murdered in a long-term care facility, but multiple subplots include the protagonist's grief over his own deceased wife, his growing affection for a Dutch forensic pathologist, and his feelings of guilt for his conduct as a former railroad attorney, which led, ultimately, to the situation in which June becomes a victim of her husband's rage. Also, based upon the author's own experience as a war crimes journalist in the Hague, the novel delves into issues surrounding the prosecution of European war criminals in the former Yugoslavia. These subplots get knotted together with the underlying moral concept that the "greatest evil is the evil that can pass for good," which diminishes the overall impact and reduces events to a tangled tapestry of courtroom drama. Wrongful Death has a lot of potential as a fast-paced thriller but fails to fulfill its promise. An optional purchase for public libraries. Jill M. Tempest, Ocean Springs Municipal Lib., MS Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.