{"id":10661,"date":"2023-10-16T08:23:10","date_gmt":"2023-10-16T12:23:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=10661"},"modified":"2023-10-16T08:23:10","modified_gmt":"2023-10-16T12:23:10","slug":"the-plinko-bounce","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=10661","title":{"rendered":"The Plinko Bounce"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Fans of television\u2019s classic quiz show, The Price is Right<\/a><\/em>, will recognize the Plinko in the title of Martin Clark\u2019s new legal thriller. It\u2019s a juiced-up game not dissimilar to Pachinko, the Japanese gambling game that similarly titled an award-winning 2017 novel. The connection both these books have to their eponymous games is the notion that seemingly random developments steer someone\u2019s fate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Patrick County, Virginia, public defender Andy Hughes finds himself saddled once again with the thankless job of representing serial offender Damian Bullins. And these are Bullins\u2019s most serious charges yet. This time he\u2019s accused of murdering the African American wife of Mormon pastor Cole Benson. He\u2019s even confessed. But . . .The book follows the incredible twists and turns (the Plinko bounces) that propel this case from disaster to potential success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Andy is a smart, caring guy, with a new girlfriend and an eight-year-old son. Early on, one of the county\u2019s persistent drunks and petty criminals\u2014whom staff of the public defender\u2019s office call Regulars\u2014dies in the county jail, and his dog Patches won\u2019t leave the jailhouse property. He\u2019s waiting for Zeb, as always, but this time Zeb isn\u2019t coming for him. Patches ends up part of the Andy Hughes household too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By contrast, Bullins is a hot mess. Drugs and liquor don\u2019t improve the logic he applies to his situation, but he isn\u2019t stupid. In fact, Hughes and his boss Vikram Kapil believe Bullins may be a little too clever in his ploys to outwit the system. His ability to twist every development in the case to serve his strange logic is simultaneously amusing and horrifying, as he transparently schemes to pervert justice. Apparently, he\u2019s aware this is an era when the more outlandish a claim is, the more likely it is to gain credence. The rascal just might get away with murder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Clark\u2019s characters are interesting and highly individual, with just the right amount of backstory. The beautiful areas of rural southwest Virginia on the North Carolina state line are woven into the story, as are its small towns and small-town sensibilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Author Clark is a retired Virginia circuit court judge who served on the bench for some 27 years. His experience shows in several riveting courtroom scenes. No questioning the legal underpinnings of this tale, either. Clark makes clear the limits and strains on the public defender system when it\u2019s faced with a penniless, manipulative defendant like Damian Bullins. Yet, despite giving every respect to the legal intricacies of the proceedings, Clark never gets bogged down. His writing is clear, and the story moves forward briskly. Watching Andy Hughes try to live up to the ethical tenets of his profession in the face of a thoroughly reprehensible defendant is a struggle worth witnessing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Order it from Amazon here.<\/a> (As an Amazon affiliate, I receive a small payment for products ordered through this website.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fans of television\u2019s classic quiz show, The Price is Right, will recognize the Plinko in the title of Martin Clark\u2019s new legal thriller. It\u2019s a juiced-up game not dissimilar to Pachinko, the Japanese gambling game that similarly titled an award-winning … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"A small-town public defender and a defendant you'll love to hate. Can Damien Bullins outwit the justice system once again? The juicy legal thriller is NOT dead.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[52,1567,126],"tags":[2126],"class_list":["post-10661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-crime","category-lawyer","category-reading-2","tag-virginia"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-2LX","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10661"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10663,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10661\/revisions\/10663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}