False Testimony
Rose Connors
Scribner, July 2005, $25.00, 256 pp.
ISBN 0743261976

On Cape Cod, two lawyers coming from different directions in their careers met and became partners in their own firm. Marty Nickerson spent years as a prosecuting attorney in the District Attorney's office and Harry Madigan was a public defender before they became defense attorneys. They are lovers and work together on each other's case of when they have two.

U.S. Senator Charles Kendrick's staffer Michelle Forrester disappears without a trace between the time she left her boss's home and the time she was due to visit her parents. Both his wife and daughter know he had an affair with her. He has Marty to represent him but when Michelle's dead body is found the Senator admits his guilt; Marty doesn't believe him.

Harry is concentrating on the case of Derrick Holliston, who spent most of his young life in juvenile and just got out of prison. He is charged with the murder of Father Patrick McMahon. Derrick insists that he was the victime of an assault but the state claims it was a robbery gone terribly wrong. Both lawyers believe their client is guilty but they just might get him off on a technicality.

Two different cases, two very different people from opposite sides of the economic and social strata. Neither one is telling the truth but one is innocent and his lawyer believes part of the job is to find out who it is. The legal manouvres of both lawyers are virtuosos employing brilliant strategy while in the end justice is served on all fronts. Rose Connors holds her own with the likes of John Grisham and Scott Turow.

Harriet Klausner