Unfit to Practice
A Novel
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4.2 • 20 Ratings
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- $6.99
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
It’s the moment every attorney fears most...one careless moment that threatens careers, reputations, lives. For Nina Reilly, it will change everything—and ignite a case where her own clients are witnesses against her...and where the defendant is Nina herself.
As an attorney championing desperate people, Nina Reilly has skirted the edges of legal ethics in pursuit of a just result, but she has never before broken the rule of absolute protection of her clients’ secrets. One September night in Lake Tahoe when her unlocked truck is stolen, her life changes forever. Gone are her most sensitive case files, complete with the sometimes brutally candid notes she took while interviewing her clients.
It’s every attorney’s nightmare. And now the worst has happened: The secrets are being revealed, one by one, in ways that will cause the greatest harm. Nina’s own clients complain to the State Bar of California, and suddenly Nina is fighting for her license and her livelihood in a legal proceeding that may ultimately lead her to disbarment. In desperation, Nina turns to her ex-husband, celebrated San Francisco lawyer Jack McIntyre, to represent her.
And as personal tensions erupt between McIntyre and Nina’s sometime boyfriend, private investigator Paul van Wagoner...as reputations are ruined and people begin to die...a chilling pattern of rage and revenge comes into focus. Someone is bent on destroying the lives of Nina’s clients and, in the process, Nina Reilly.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Penned by sisters Pamela and Mary O'Shaughnessy, this eighth novel to feature South Lake Tahoe attorney Nina Reilly puts the lawyer in the defendant's chair. Ever since she was a little girl, Nina has believed that rules are what people use to make sense of the world and that law is a way of enforcing the rules to keep the world sane. But when her truck is stolen, along with her three most sensitive case files, her sane world turns topsy-turvy. In the wrong hands, those files could compromise a client's chance at fair visitation rights, affect a second client's insurance claim and put two girls at risk from the murderer whose crime they witnessed. Suddenly, Nina finds herself facing possible disbarment as she's brought up on disciplinary charges before the California State Bar Court. Current boyfriend Paul and ex-husband Jack try to help Nina figure out who stole the files and, more importantly, who is trying to destroy her life. The initial setup of Nina's predicament is taut as a wire, but the story bogs down in court, where much of the testimony, while realistic, is filler: a space-occupying rehash of what the reader already knows. As for the climax, it's so hokey that the dialogue reads like an old Batmanepisode. Chances are, though, since this is just a first offense, series fans will release this effort on its own recognizance in the hopes that the next case will be a winner.
