The Lincoln Lawyer

There are two ways to look at this novel - as part of the long running Harry Bosch Universe or as a separate independent novel. Neither of these will be wrong - while some characters from the main sequence show up, the novel stands on its own - just like the earlier "Blood Work" or "The Poet" did. In some ways, these first novels in the peripheral series are actually more enjoyable than the police procedurals in the main one.

Mickey Haller is a lawyer in Los Angeles - jaded, not very well paid and ready to cross almost any line if it will help him (and peripherally his client - although that is almost never his priority). And out of the blue he gets his hands on a case which may be his meal ticket for awhile. Except that that meal show more ticket, Louis Roulet, seems to be a thoroughly unpleasant man. Which usually would not be an issue for Mickey - except that he had advised a previous client to plead guilty -- for a crime which now Louis looks good for.

At the start of the novel, Mickey looks almost the opposite of Bosch (and if you had read the earlier novels, that is very obvious - none of them perfect but Mickey seems to be too self-centered). But as the novel progresses, it turns out that there is a morality under all that jadedness - he has his own moral compass and even he has a breaking point. It is not a tale of redeeming a fallen lawyer or of a lawyer finding again why he went into the profession. While the Mickey of the end of the novel is different from the one at the start, the change is more of a normal human reconsideration of his choices than a full blown discovery of a new path.

Add to that a pretty decent thriller around the whole red herrings and more crime coming into it and the novel is a mix of a courtroom drama and a thriller that manages to find the correct ratio of the mix to keep it entertaining.

If you had never read Connelly before, this is not a bad novel to start with -- but it may give you a bad idea of what you usually get from one of his novels. There is a lot that is recognizable but the character arc of Mickey is very different from any others in his oeuvre up to this point.

Reading the novel almost 20 years after it came out means that I knew some things about it - including who Mickey Haller's half brother is. It is irrelevant to this novel and it will come into play in later novels but it was fun to see some elements from the older novels showing up in the periphery. show less

Michael Connelly takes a break from the Harry Bosch series and rolls out a new character named Mickey Haller, a colourful, witty, and busy defence lawyer who mainly works out of the backseat of his Lincoln as he hunts the courts of Los Angeles County for likely cases.

In this well-focused novel, Connelly offers a new take on the "noir" hero - ironic, beaten down, but with finer aspirations – by melding it with the popular conception of the sleazy criminal defence lawyer.

Haller has been called to defend a Beverly Hills real estate salesman who has a reputation as something of a playboy, and who's been accused of attempted rape. Haller is desperate for the case, thinking that it will be a "franchise", a case that goes on for a long time show more and will result in large fees for him. When things go wrong and someone close to Haller is killed in the course of the investigation, he has to figure a lawyer's way out of the predicament he's gotten himself into. The result is amusing, to say the least.

The Lincoln Lawyer is classic Connolly - exciting, interesting, and crisply told. While he’s not Harry Bosch, Mickey Haller is a character I look forward to meeting again. show less

I have been so busy that no new books have grabbed me. I have tried a few and abandoned them all. I finally picked this book up in order to finally move off the BL space that I have been on for I think 3 weeks now. I am so glad that I read the first book in the Mickey Haller series. This book is fire. I loved every part of it and it was just what I needed right now.

Mickey Haller is a defense attorney in Los Angeles. He has not had much luck in getting what he calls a "franchise" case these days. Meaning he is trying to get a client that is going to mean big money to him down the line. When he is unexpectedly called to handle a very rich client who is accused of attempted rape and assault, he wonders if he finally found what he is show more looking for. However, not is all that it appears, and then Haller has to think about justice and what you would do to make sure the innocent don't pay for what others have done.

I loved Haller as a character. Very complicated and not similar to Harry Bosch at all. We find out that Haller's father died when he was five and was a world famous defense attorney. With two failed marriages behind him, and a nine year old daughter he wants to get close to, he is doing what he can to track down his white whale, his franchise client that will put him over the top.

I liked that Connelly took a look at defense attorneys. Haller has a lot of crap spewed his way by the prosecutors and cops he goes up against in this book. And honestly, I liked his point of view. He is there to do what he can for the best of his clients. Even though we may not like that people get defended for all matters of things, I like a book that made the point that everyone should be treated the same under the law, even if they are guilty as sin. If the prosecutor or cops mess up, there are repercussions to that. With many cases in the news right now that are disheartening to me as a citizen, it made me feel good that we just had Haller out there swinging away to make sure he did what he was supposed to do in his branch of the justice system.

We also get a look at some other characters that I managed to like in such a short time. Haller's two ex-wives are total opposites, but both definitely still care/love him. He doesn't have a terrible relationship with women at all it seems. He respects them and I loved how he was not here for his one ex and her disparaging going out of his way to keep helping a troubled prostitute that he saw sliding away into a life she was never going to get out of. There's a throw away line there about Haller doing what he can to help these women like his father did which is a nice callback to a Bosch novel. I won't spoil anything for readers who haven't read a Bosch book, but when I read "The Brass Verdict" I will happily spoil away.

We have a tightly constructed plot that I don't want to give too much away about, but ultimately Haller realizes that he is in between a rock and a hard place according to the law. And I loved how Connelly resolves the whole thing. I don't know if it would be true to life, but whatever, I loved the ending.

The writing was really good and I think the story being told from Haller's POV is what made the story pop for me. Also doesn't hurt that I kept imagining Matthew Mcconaughey talking the whole time in my head.

The flow was excellent from beginning to end. I loved how little legal tidbits got included in what Haller was saying to you the whole time. And a look at some of his cases was pretty great too.

Cannot wait for the next book!

Bank:
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June 4: $62. Read "The Wind in the Willows" paperback edition, 256 pages: $3.00
June 27: $67. Read "The Lincoln Lawyer" kindle edition, 528 pages: $5.00. show less

In my recent discovery of the works of Michael Connelly, through his Harry Bosch series, I became acquainted with his other successful saga featuring defense lawyer Mickey Haller: just like it happened with Bosch, I “met” Haller first in his cinematic version with the movie The Lincoln Lawyer and then through the more recent Netflix series with the same title. Jumping from screen to book was indeed a given for me, and the narrative links between the two book series made me often think of another successful TV show, Law and Order, with Bosch representing the “Law” side of the story and Haller taking the “Order” role through the intriguing courtroom scenes which are the backbone of the story and that appeal to me even more show more than police procedurals.

Mickey Haller is a defense attorney nicknamed “The Lincoln Lawyer” because he prefers to do all his work aboard a Lincoln Town Car, while his driver shuttles him all over Los Angeles between the courtrooms and the prisons - yes because Mickey’s clientele mostly comes from the lower strata of society: biker gangs, small-time offenders, prostitutes and so on. He’s well-known in those circles for being the kind of lawyer who often manages to acquit his clients, or when that doesn’t work, to get them a reduced sentence. He works with quantity rather than quality, and is always looking for the “coup” that might present him with some financial stability, which he sorely needs given that he has two ex-wives - one of them a prosecutor he often meets while touring courtrooms and the other presently working as his case manager - and a hillside house with a great view, which he’s still paying for.

So, when one of his many contacts presents him with the potential for a “franchise client”, the kind of client who promises steady income over the years, he does not look too closely into this proverbial gift horse’s mouth, hardly wondering why affluent Louis Roulet wanted someone like Haller to defend him against the accusation of having savagely beaten a prostitute. Roulet looks and sounds innocent - something of a change given Haller’s usual clientele - but some inconsistencies in the course of the investigation compel the lawyer to look closely at the evidence and bring him to a devastating discovery, one that forces him to navigate the extremely narrow margin between his commitment as an attorney and his conscience.

By now I know that Michael Connelly’s writing never fails to engage me, but with this novel I was even more intrigued than usual, to the point that I did something I rarely - if ever - do: I read the first three books in the series back to back, and I not only avoided any kind of “story fatigue”, but I ended up feeling eager to continue with the series. Hook, line and sinker, indeed… What I found fascinating, besides the story itself, is the dichotomy between Haller’s outwardly sleazy persona and his own ethics, a divide that creates a multi-faceted, quite humanly believable character. He is a man very focused on his work and somehow haunted by the ghost of his father, a famous lawyer whose professional shadow he keenly feels, even though the man died when Mickey was still a child.

I’m indulging in a little spoiler here, because it’s not a major one: Haller and Bosch are half brothers from that father’s side (something that I already knew thanks to my searches about Connelly’s works, and that is revealed in the second novel), and it’s interesting here to look for the two men’s points of contact and differences - despite the opposing sides of the law in which they work, they are both quite committed to their profession, to the point that both of them have sacrificed emotional entanglements to pursue that drive, but where Bosch is his very own man, forced from early childhood to depend only on himself, Haller often feels the weight of that larger-than-life father and the unconscious need to be “worthy” of his legacy. In the end, both men are striving for justice, each in his own different way and through totally different means, and I’m certain that the juxtaposition of these two characters will offer many intriguing considerations down the road.

In this first Lincoln Lawyer novel, Michael Connelly fuses very successfully characterization and plot, creating an engrossing story that quite deserves the title of “page turner”: once again I came to the written word after experiencing the plot through the cinematic medium, and yet I was never bored or distracted by that knowledge because this is the kind of writer who knows how to capture his audience’s attention and keep it riveted from start to finish. Here the mix of courtroom debate, police investigation and unexpected twists and turns takes the readers through a story that is more than a simple legal thriller because it also explores, very compellingly, the nooks and crannies of the human soul while it showcases the intricacies of the legal system in a way that is everything but pedantic.

It’s true that my TBR hardly needed another book series to weigh it down, but this new addition promises to offer many hours of absorbing reading, so I will not complain…. ;-) show less

I had no idea when I began reading The Lincoln Lawyer by Michael Connelly that it was such a highly regarded mystery novel. I had heard of the movie starring Matthew McMcConaughey, so when the ebook went on sale for $2.99 I figured it was a pretty safe bet to be entertaining. It was all that and more. It's no wonder that in 2006 it was awarded the Shamus Award and the Macavity Award for best mystery novel and, in 2010 was nominated for the Best Mystery Novel of the Decade.

The central character is defense attorney Mickey Haller, whose office is a Lincoln Town Car driven around L.A. by a former client who owes him legal fees. When Haller takes on a wealthy client who is accused of sexual assault and attempted murder, what begins as an show more easy case turns into something much more twisted and sinister.

The Lincoln Lawyer takes the reader into the morally complex world of the defense attorney, and Connelly does an admirable job of immersing the reader into Haller's life.

I enjoyed the book immensely and couldn't put it down. It's definitely gritty and dark, but it also has strong character development, compelling courtroom drama, and enough plot twists to keep you guessing until the very end.

Fans of Michael Connelly probably already know this, but Mickey Haller is related to Connelly's other major character, Harry Bosch. If The Lincoln Lawyer is representative of Connelly's other novels, then I'll definitely be looking to read more of his books. show less

Mickey Haller's father, a legendary defense attorney of the same name, left him the following advice: "The scariest client a lawyer will ever have is an innocent client. Because if you [screw] up and he goes to prison, it'll scar you for life." Mick thought he never had to consider this warning until he was asked to defend Louis Roulet, a wealthy real estate agent who is accused and arrested for aggravated assault against a local prostitute. He quickly learns that this individual has the potential to be, what the legal industry labels as, a "franchise client", a client who may not only be a "cash cow" but, if he wins the case, can allow him to demand higher fees from future clients. Mick believes his protestations of innocence until he show more discovers similarities in this case and a past pro-bono case in which he fears that an innocent man might have been plea bargained into a fifteen-year sentence. How can he defend his current client when he might have been the killer of the another prostitute in which a former client may be unjustly serving time?

This is the second time I read this book, the first was for one book discussion group and the second for another. Actually, I read the first and listened to the audiobook the second time around. The book is enlightening depicting the American justice sentence like a machine with attorneys serving to keeping the gears lubed. An enjoyable read, which has interested me in reading others in the Lincoln Lawyer series. show less

I found this to be an excellent work of popular fiction -- well written with an engaging plot, and notable memorable characters. Published in 2005, it was the first of Michael Connelly's "Lincoln Lawyer" books, and offered a highly promising beginning to what was to become a successful series. The 2011 film that it spawned stayed very true to the book in style and plot, and is worth seeing as well.

Criminal defense attorney Mickey Haller takes on the defense of a wealthy LA realtor named Louis Roulet, who has been accused of assault and attempted murder of a prostitute. Louis protests his innocence, and claims to have been framed by perpetrators who seek to level a multi-million dollar civil suit. But as Haller investigates, he not only show more finds reason to doubt his client, but to suspect that he himself is the one being set up. I won't say more as to avoid revealing the plot twists. Suffice to say that Haller not only faces ethical dilemmas (as in what to do when suspecting his own client of a terrible crime) but finds his own family to be in serious danger. The denouement is satisfying at all levels; but frankly, I found the culmination in the movie to be even more so. I highly recommend this work, and plan to read others by this talented author. show less