Final appeal

A pair of Warsaw attorneys take on a murder case in which everything is stacked against them in Mróz's debut thriller. Businessman Piotr Langer's wealth has shielded him from any criminal repercussions arising from the accusations that he's taken advantage of women whose immigrations he's helped arrange. But there's a limit to how much he can help his son when the police find Piotr Langer Jr. in his apartment with a pair of 10-day-old corpses. The firm of Żelazny & McVay, hired to defend the accused, assigns senior associate Joanna Chyłka to the case, and she sweeps along Kordian Oryński, a brand-new legal trainee, even though she clearly looks down her nose at him. As Chyłka puts it, the defense must contend with three adversaries: the justice system, which presumes that Langer is guilty; the defendant's father, who's footing his legal bills on the condition that he plead not guilty by reason of insanity; and the defendant himself, who opens his mouth only long enough to assure his attorneys that he's not insane. In fact, the defense has even more enemies than Chyłka knows, for an unnamed Grey-Haired Man and his underling, the Bald Man, are determined to undermine the defense for their own reasons. When an unexpected development after the court sentences Langer to life imprisonment makes it possible for the attorneys to file an appeal, the Grey-Haired Man and the Bald Man leap into action with a violence that threatens to divide Chyłka and Oryński once and for all. Readers who persist beyond all the further obstacles and quiddities that greet the defenders will be treated to a walloping climactic surprise as impossible to predict as it is to believe. A heavy lift for characters and readers alike. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.