Got to the point in Michael Connelly’s Harry Bosch book series where the characters Harry Bosch and Mickey Haller really cross. Decided I would stop and go back and read the Mickey Haller books starting with The Lincoln Lawyer before reading The Crossing. I will probably do the same with Connelly’s Renée Ballard series. The Lincoln Lawyer and the Mickey Haller character are classic Connelly. You like Haller in the same way you like Bosch. The story is tight and well-paced.
Visit the book page on the author’s site
Connelly did a background piece on The Lincoln Lawyer which you can read on his site. Here is Connelly’s background video on the book:
Teresa and I have never watched The Lincoln Lawyer movie. It’s on Amazon, so adding to the watch list.
The Lincoln Lawyer
By Michael Connelly
Mickey Haller has spent all his professional life afraid that he wouldn’t recognize innocence if it stood right in front of him. But what he should have been on the watch for was evil.
Haller is a Lincoln Lawyer, a criminal defense attorney who operates out of the back seat of his Lincoln Town Car, traveling between the far-flung courthouses of Los Angeles to defend clients of every kind. Bikers, con artists, drunk drivers, drug dealers — they’re all on Mickey Haller’s client list. For him, the law is rarely about guilt or innocence — it’s about negotiation and manipulation. Sometimes it’s even about justice.
A Beverly Hills playboy arrested for attacking a woman he picked up in a bar chooses Haller to defend him, and Mickey has his first high-paying client in years. It is a defense attorney’s dream, what they call a franchise case. And as the evidence stacks up, Haller comes to believe this may be the easiest case of his career.
Then someone close to him is murdered and Haller discovers that his search for innocence has brought him face-to-face with evil as pure as a flame. To escape without being burned, he must deploy every tactic, feint, and instinct in his arsenal — this time to save his own life.
The Lincoln Lawyer was released as a feature film in March 2011. The movie stars Matthew McConaughey as Mickey Haller, Marisa Tomei as Maggie McPherson, and Ryan Phillippe as Louis Roulet.
Published October 1, 2005
528 pages (print)