Reckless Disregard
A Parker Stern Novel
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4.0 • 5 Ratings
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
Former topnotch attorney Parker Stern, still crippled by courtroom stage fright, takes on a dicey case for an elusive video game designer known to the world only by the name of "Poniard." In Poniard's blockbuster online video game, Abduction!, a real-life movie mogul is charged with kidnapping and murdering a beautiful actress who disappeared in the 1980s. Predictably, the mogul--William "the Conqueror" Bishop--has responded with a libel lawsuit. Now it's up to Parker to defend the game designer in the suit. In defending Poniard, Parker discovers that people aren't who they claim to be and that nothing is as it seems. At one point, his client resorts to blackmail, threatening to expose a dark secret about Parker. Then, many of the potential witnesses who could have helped the case die prematurely, and the survivors are too frightened to talk. Parker begins to feel as if he's merely a character in a video game, fighting malevolent Level Bosses who appear out of nowhere and threaten to destroy him. From the Trade Paperback edition.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Rotstein's contrived second contemporary legal thriller featuring child actor turned attorney Parker Stern (after 2013's Corrupt Practices), a video game creator known only as Poniard is in trouble. William Bishop, a major Hollywood power player, is suing Poniard because he claims that the gamer's latest hit, Abduction!, identifies him as the kidnapper of actress Felicity McGrath, who disappeared in 1987. Poniard, who refuses to reveal his true identity, hires Stern to fight the defamation suit. The road to the truth takes a number of improbable and convoluted turns. For example, Lovely Diamond, Stern's former lover, turns out to be Bishop's attorney and her son has a special link to Abduction! Readers should also be prepared for some overwrought prose (e.g., "the heart is truly the reservoir of love and emotion, because my own heart gambols and twirls and finds a jubilant equilibrium I thought was gone forever").
