Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1172 in Books
• Published on: 2007-04-03
• Released on: 2007-04-03
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 400 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Hart's stunning debut, an exceptionally deep and complex mystery thriller, compares favorably to the best of Scott Turow. Jackson Workman Pickens, whom most people call "Work," is a struggling North Carolina criminal defense attorney. Work has wrestled with inner demons for most of his life, especially after the death of his mother and the disappearance of his wealthy father, Ezra Pickens, a highly successful lawyer who took him into his practice. Trapped in a loveless marriage and haunted by poor emotional choices and his sister's psychological trauma, Work finds himself under suspicion when his father's corpse surfaces more than a year after Ezra was last seen alive. Work's quest for the truth behind his father's demise opens old wounds and forces him to face the consequences of his own decisions. Few readers will be able to resist devouring this tour-de-force in one or two sittings—or clamoring for more John Hart.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From School Library Journal
Adult/High School–Jackson Workman Pickens, or Work, has always lived in the shadow of his larger-than-life father, a respected attorney. His life as he knows it–the law practice he shares with his father, the beautiful home and socialite wife–is a tribute to Ezra Pickens's ideas of success. When Ezra is found shot to death, Work is ambivalent about helping the police find the killer, afraid that the path will lead to his younger sister, Jean. Only he and Jean know how abusive their father was and how his actions ultimately led to their mother's death. Work's reticence only serves to reinforce the lead detective's belief that he is the guilty party, especially since he stands to inherit over $15 million. As Work becomes more enmeshed in a web of circumstantial evidence, he learns that his sister's partner, Alexandria, was convicted of killing her own abusive father, and he begins to fear for his sister's safety as well as his own. Hart has crafted a mystery with fully developed characters and a fast-paced and intelligent plot. He not only gives readers plenty of action and suspense, but also delves unflinchingly into the dynamics of family relationships. Teens who enjoy Grisham and Turow will want to be among the first to read this exciting new voice in the mystery genre.–Kim Dare, Fairfax County Public Schools, VA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Bookmarks Magazine
John Hart, a former criminal defense attorney, has written a character-driven whodunit that has critics effusive with praise. Compared to John Grisham and Scott Turow, Hart crafts a story filled with trauma, intrigue, plot twists (with some foreshadowing), and measured, powerful prose. Set in a Southern town, the story chronicles Work's descent into hell as he replays his relationship with his father, recognizes his "flawed" soul, and finds a circuitous path to redemption. "He's an original voice in a crowded genre, a welcome addition to both the worlds of literature and suspense," notes the Denver Post. Fortunately, St. Martin's Press and Hart have struck a deal for two more books.

Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc.

Customer Reviews

Exciting debut!
I enjoyed this book so much. The main character, a man as flawed as the rest of us, had me enthralled from the first page. By the middle of the book, I found myself unable to put it down, reading page after page as fast as I could. I have to admit, I kind of had the whole thing figured out, but that didn't take away the pleasure of reading this book to the end. A little twist here, a liitle twist there, great reading.
I look forward to your next book Mr. Hart.

Grisham Buried in Pop Psychology
Ezra Pickens, North Carolina backwoods lawyer extraordinaire and hardass of Olympian proportions, has been missing for eighteen months and feared dead. When his skeletal reamins are finally found in an abandoned mall, there is no doubt he was murdered. Lawyer son Jackson Workman Pickens, or "Work", stumbles around in some feeble attempt to protect sister Jean, who he believes the perp, and soon finds himself the prime suspect.

John Hart's debut reads like two different novels. In the first half of the novel, I found "Work" simply annoying. I doubt that Hart wanted to make his protagonist such a wimp, but about 100 pages of Work's whining about his childhood, his mean rich daddy, and his pathetic life in general was just grinding me down. OK, so he's not had the model life, and as a result his drinking, adultery, and general shiftlessness is justified. We got all that - let's move on.

And remarkably, Hart does just that. Once past the bitch wife, the gay sister and her wacko girlfriend, and the cop with a grudge, Hart spins a genuinely suspenseful mystery and legal drama, reminiscent of Scott Turow in his early days. The plot thickens, unfolds, takes a couple of entertainingly ugly diversions, and finishes with a John Grisham flourish. Hart has literary skills, no doubt about it, and he spices up his drama with tales of child abuse and murder definitely not for the feint of heart. While off to a slow start, Hart finishes strong, and is definitely a name to watch.

A good Whodunnit with high literary value, good characters
A small-town lawyer's midlife crisis is sparked by the discovery of the dead body of his overbearing father. Although told in the first person, the tale gives good background and many interesting stories about other characters. In his search for his father's killer, the narrator uncovers a lot of dirt, human suffering, and neglect in his small town, all while trying to juggle his own affairs and keep himself out of jail as the prime suspect. Our first-person narrator has a good literary style while not sounding too cute about it (unlike some other famous authors' attempts at first-person writing).

It would seem very difficult to write a good first-person thriller, giving the reader all of the necessary clues to solve the case while still making us go "D'oh, I should have known!" at the end. Kudos to the author for pulling it off.