Fans of John Lescroart's series hero Dismas Hardy, the thoughtful and
likable San Francisco lawyer, will welcome this meditation on marriage
served up as a murder mystery. In previous outings, Hardy has been a
cop, a bartender, and even an assistant prosecutor, so he knows that,
"Sometimes the whole truth is the last thing you want to hear." But
then his wife Franny goes to jail for refusing to tell what she knows
about the husband of a murdered environmental activist. The Hardy's
children are classmates of the victim's youngsters, and Dismas must
confront the secrets in his own relationship that have been concealed
by the all-too-familiar pressures of trying to balance work and love in
the modern family. The plot, which involves oil, gas, ethanol, and
gubernatorial politics, doesn't take center stage in this carefully
written and deeply compelling novel; the real action is the series of
revelations about the crime in question, which uncover the more
interesting story of how even a good marriage can deteriorate
despite--or perhaps because of--the daily work of trying to keep it
going.
