Legal Briefs: Short Stories by Today's Best Thriller Writers

Anthologies often have a way of dulling the senses. The varying styles of the several authors, despite the theme that ties them together, can have the taste and feel of cotton candy: initially sweet, but ultimately cloying and too insubstantial for lasting value. However, William Bernhardt has put together a collection by best-selling author-attorneys that's more engaging than most and that stands the test of being read from cover to cover. Although the two richest stories (John Grisham's "The Birthday" and Richard North Patterson's "The Client") have been printed previously, the remaining nine can be safely recommended and serve as a solid introductions to each of the writers included.

Bernhardt explains in his introduction that the only limitations set on the contributors were those imposed by their own imaginations, and most took the opportunity to write of an intriguing character or plot twist not found in their longer efforts. Steve Martini's "Poetic Justice," for example, is a witty fantasy pushing the limits of the cliche that cheaters never win, while Philip Friedman envisions a much darker world in which the protagonist, en route to argue against the death penalty, finds himself embroiled in random violence that mirrors the crimes of his defendants and evokes ghosts in his past.

Although the stories are a pleasure to read, Bernhardt's introduction to the collection would have been sufficient: the additional prefaces to each story are unnecessary. And while the authors' postscripts provide insights into their motivations for writing, they are the kind that are best saved for talk-show interviews (Grisham wisely lets his story speak for itself). These are, obviously, minor flaws. On the whole, the collection serves its purpose: a broad and diverting introduction to the genre of legal thrillers and their most skillful authors. --K.A. Crouch