The Gods of Guilt (A Lincoln Lawyer Novel, 5)

An Amazon Best Book of the Month, December 2013: What distinguishes Connelly's Lincoln Lawyer books from the average legal thriller (in the same way his Harry Bosch series transcends "cop story") is the complicated likeability of his flawed hero, Mickey Haller, a criminal defense lawyer who works mostly from the backseat of a chauffeured Lincoln Town Car. In The Gods of Guilt, Haller agrees to defend a former client's pimp on a murder charge, and his messy past comes back to taunt him--an ideal introduction to Haller for newcomers, and catnip for fans. As a former newspaper court reporter, I've always appreciated Connelly's attention to the messy particulars of the legal system, and his ability to convey real courtroom drama, the humanity and inanity of bringing criminals to justice--or not. (The title refers to the imperfect judgment of a jury.) Like his peers, Laura Lippman and George Pelecanos, Connelly writes crime fiction verging subversively on literature, and Haller is becoming an increasingly complex literary figure, cruising LA's darkest corners in a style that feels like a modern twist on Chinatown. (Think Clint Eastwood-Dirty Harry-San Francisco, but in LA, and without the big guns and the unresolved anger.) Incredibly, Connelly just keeps getting better. --Neal Thompson