Review by Booklist Review
Florida defense attorney Jack Swyteck returns in Grippando's spectacular new legal thriller. The story begins in Iran during the 2022 Masha Amini protests (during which several young women died in police custody after being arrested for violating Iran's restrictive laws of conduct). A woman trying to get her young daughter to safety is taken by the police; somehow, she reappears in Miami, with her daughter, facing a charge of kidnapping brought against her by her estranged husband. Immediately after he agrees to take her case, Jack discovers that she hasn't exactly been telling the truth. Which makes his job more difficult, and leads to a host of seriously tricky questions. The author, who was a practicing lawyer for a number of years, makes the story feel entirely real, and it's easy to imagine an actual case just like this playing out. Swyteck continues to be one of the more compelling legal-thriller protagonists, and Grippando continues to be one of the genre's best craftsmen. Another winner in this consistently excellent series.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Grippando stretches plausibility to the breaking point in the goofy 19th adventure for Miami attorney Jack Swyteck (after Goodbye Girl). Swyteck's marriage to FBI agent Andie Henning is on the rocks, but at their therapist's suggestion, the couple agrees to abandon a self-imposed rule not to discuss work. They wind up at odds, however, when Avi Zarid, an Iranian woman who disappeared after she was arrested for protesting the country's hijab mandate two years earlier, resurfaces with her daughter in Florida and hires Swyteck to represent her in a custody battle with her husband, Farid. Farid claims--along with the Iranian government--that Avi kidnapped their daughter. Soon, "Avi" reveals to Swyteck that she's actually the woman's sister, Zahra, and alleges that Iranian officials killed Avi and are backing Farid's lawsuit to conceal the crime. Andie gets involved when her boss at the FBI asks her to steer Swyteck away from the case. The fizzy Mr. and Mrs. Smith--style antics are plenty enjoyable, and Grippando knows how to keep the stakes high, but even the most casual reader will raise an eyebrow at the contrived plot twists and laughable foreign policy details. It's pure popcorn. Agent: Richard Pine, InkWell Management. (Jan.)
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review
No sooner has he promised to cut back dramatically on the criminal defense cases that have made his reputation and poisoned his marriage to FBI undercover agent Andie Henning than Jack Swyteck accepts a custody case whose stakes are even higher. Farid Bazzi, a partner in six hotels in Iran, contends that his wife, Ava Bazzi, broke out of a Tehran prison after her arrest by the morality police, grabbed their 6-year-old daughter, Yasmin, and fled to Miami. The revelation that the client determined to keep Yasmin is actually Farid's second wife, Ava's sister Zahra, uncovers the first of many lies by every party, which Jack will have to wade through in representing her. The custody hearing, which ought to be routine, is introduced by a violent threat against Jack--"If you make this case about what happened to Ava, someone is going to get hurt"--and highlighted by Tehran banker Nouri Asmoun's virtual testimony that he was Ava's lover, Zahra and Farid's dueling claims over whether Ava is dead or alive, and mounting pressure from shadowy U.S. government representatives on both Jack and Andie to avoid pursuing any inquiries about Ava in order to protect their government's negotiations over the release of antiquities broker Brian Guthrie. Hours after a surprising development delivers a victory for Jack and his client, another equally unexpected development plunges them into a new round of woes. As he tightens the screws on Jack and Andie, Grippando uses every possible legal device and convention to turn questions about the Iranian government's treatment of women into agonizingly personal tragedies. A dizzying series of textbook lessons in how aggrieved litigants weaponize legal procedures, and vice versa. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
