The Only Good Lawyer (John Francis Cuddy Mystery) - Hardcover

Jeremiah F. Healy

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0671009532 ISBN 13: 9780671009533

Publisher: Atria Books, 1998

Synopsis

With the help of his irrepressible hero, John Francis Cuddy, Jeremiah Healy never fails to deliver scintillating, perfectly pitched mystery masterpieces in what The New York Times Book Review calls "a superior series." Now the Shamus Award-winning author "looks ready to join the honors class of private-eye writers that includes Robert B. Parker" (USA Today), as he introduces us to The Only Good Lawyer.

An attorney friend of Boston P.l. John Cuddy has called in a favor, looking into the case of Alan Spaeth. Spaeth is one sorry piece of work -- a down-and-out divorce squeeze, a racist, a misogynist, and from all appearances, a cold-blooded killer. Frankly wishing the whole mess would disappear, Cuddy can't let it. It pains him, but he's convinced of Spaeth's innocence, and he isn't the kind of P.l. who can watch even a guy like Spaeth fry for someone else's crime.

As much as Cuddy is repulsed by the accused, he's intrigued by the victim, Woodrow Wilson Gant, the African-American lawyer who had been representing Spaeth's wife in a very nasty divorce. But before Cuddy's investigation is done, there will be plenty of nastiness to go around. On the surface, Gant led a charmed and successful life as a rising star in the glittering firmament of Massachusetts law. But three quick bullets at a deserted roadside knocked Gant out of the Boston skyline for good, and now Cuddy's discovered the attorney was also a man of strange desires and deep secrets?secrets that could prove lethal to the touch....

Ricocheting from Gant's law offices, Cuddy picks up the trail of a woman who fled the scene of the murder. Rousted by a couple of loan sharks and conned by Gant's avaricious brother, Cuddy stumbles on a more personal question. The mere mention of Gant's name puts a cold, hard kink in his relationship with Assistant D.A. Nancy Meagher, and Cuddy's Iosing sleep wondering why.

Greed. Revenge. Jealousy. There is any number of motives for murder, and Cuddy can take his pick as he investigates the high-profile homicide of Woodrow Wilson Gant, exploring the raw passion -- and touching every nerve -- of the edge.

About this title

About the Author

Jeremiah Healy
is a graduate of Harvard Law School. He won the Shamus Award for The Staked Goat, and has been nominated five additional times for Best Novel as well as for Best Short Story. The Only Good Lawyer is the twelfth book in his acclaimed series featuring John Francis Cuddy.

From the Back Cover

An attorney friend of Boston P.I. John Cuddy has called in a favor, looking into the case of Alan Spaeth. Spaeth is one sorry piece of work - a down-and-out divorce squeeze, a racist, a misogynist, and from all appearances, a cold-blooded killer. Frankly wishing the whole mess would disappear, Cuddy can't let it. It pains him, but he's convinced of Spaeth's innocence, and he isn't the kind of P.I. who can watch even a guy like Spaeth fry for someone else's crime. As much as Cuddy is repulsed by the accused, he's intrigued by the victim, Woodrow Wilson Gant, the African-American lawyer who had been representing Spaeth's wife in a very nasty divorce. Ricocheting from Gant's law offices, Cuddy picks up the trail of a woman who fled the scene of the murder. Rousted by a couple of loan sharks and conned by Gant's avaricious brother, Cuddy stumbles on a more personal question. The mere mention of Gant's name puts a cold, hard kink in his relationship with Assistant D. A. Nancy Meagher, and Cuddy's losing sleep wondering why.

Reviews

A successful Boston divorce lawyer has been executed; the estranged husband of his latest client, a churlish bigot, has been arrested for the murder. What's not to like, right? But John Francis Cuddy reluctantly agrees to help Alan Spaeth's lawyer with Spaeth's defense, even though signing onto Spaeth's cause obviously won't help Cuddy's relationship with Nancy Meagher, his favorite prosecutor. After days of beating the bushes, Cuddy comes up with any number of people who might've wanted Woodrow Gant dead: his most recent lover, the unemployed brother who benefitted to the tune of a $100,000 insurance policy, the law partner whose payoff was ten times richer, the onetime gang- banger whose stint in prison did nothing to make him forget the lawyer who put him there. What he doesn't find is any evidence that his client is innocent. Worse still, the most important discovery the cops make, Spaeth's alibi witness, is in no shape to testify on his buddy's behalf, and it's clear that Cuddy's cage-rattling is getting to the killer. Looks like Cuddy's 12th will be a bust--unless there's a last-minute burst of evidence whose timing puts this case well below Invasion of Privacy (1996). -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

In the 12th John Francis Cuddy mystery (after 1996's Invasion of Privacy), Healy again pungently conjures the people and geography of working-class Boston while delivering a portrait of the hero as a man of principle and a meticulously detailed description of the work?warts, boredom and all?of being a PI. But the overall impact of this tale is seriously compromised by an unconvincing resolution. Asked by an attorney friend to take on a particularly repellent client, a loutish racist charged with killing his wife's African American divorce lawyer, the reluctant Cuddy finds himself gradually believing that Alan Spaeth is being framed. Searching for other suspects in the fatal roadside shooting of Woodrow Wilson Gant, Cuddy comes up with a debt-ridden brother, a dangerous pair of Amerasian gangsters and various partners in Gant's firm with devious private agendas. Along the way, Cuddy is badly beaten and seriously shot. His involvement in the case brings about a rupture in his love life with a female prosecutor, and he manages to find time for a trademark graveside chat with his late wife. But the plot doesn't do the ambience justice, marking Healy's latest as a rare disappointment.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Boston private investigator John Cuddy despises his employer's client?accused of murdering an up-and-coming African American lawyer?but believes in his innocence. He turns, therefore, to secrets in the murder victim's past. A good series addition from a practiced hand.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Alan Spaeth is a virulent racist who has threatened to kill his wife's black divorce lawyer. When the lawyer, Woodrow Gant, is found dead with Spaeth's gun at the scene, the cops toss Spaeth in jail immediately. Spaeth is defended by a longtime friend of Boston private eye John Francis Cuddy, who reluctantly agrees to investigate. Although Cuddy finds Spaeth repugnant, he begins to believe his story. Soon other suspects emerge: the unidentified woman Gant left a restaurant with the night he was killed; the restaurant's owners, whom Gant once sent to prison; Gant's colleagues at the law firm he was about to abandon. The twelfth entry in the Shamus-winning Cuddy series is noteworthy for its byzantine plot as well as the usual Cuddy strengths: characterization, dialogue, and explosive action. Wes Lukowsky

Edition details

• Publisher: Atria Books
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0671009532
• ISBN 13: 9780671009533
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 304