Reviews for Prime witness

Book list
From Booklist, Copyright © American Library Association. Used with permission.

When Paul Madriani, at the behest of a sick friend, becomes the acting district attorney of a small town, he quickly finds himself in the eye of a storm created by a series of unexplained murders. Madriani is under attack on several fronts: a county board that has accepted him begrudg~ingly; an opposing counsel with a vendetta; an inept staff embroiled in office politics; a judge with a personal stake in the case and a deep-rooted dislike for Madriani; and a resentful wife in an already strained marriage. The novel effectively relays the great demands of being a district attorney and also depicts the behind-the-scenes maneuverings of a trial. In some spots, though, the character development is shallow, and the resolution relies too heavily on information never made available to the reader. Still, this letdown comes at the end of a generally satisfying courtroom drama. Marginally recommended. ~--Scott Wilkens


School Library Journal
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YA-When Paul Madriani agrees to fill in temporarily as Special County Prosecutor, he has no idea that he will become involved in a serial murder case. The search for the ``Putah Creek Killer'' leads to the arrest of a college security guard, Andre Iganovich. Adrian Chambers, the defense counsel, has a shady professional past and a deep-seated dislike for Madriani, who was instrumental in the attorney's previous suspension from the bar association. As the evidence unfolds, discrepancies between the first two double murders and the third one become apparent, leading the prosecution to believe that a copy-cat murderer is on the loose. Threats against Madriani's family, legal posturing, the identification of a witness to the third set of murders, and a killer's desperation combine to produce a thrilling story.-Grace Baun, R.E. Lee High School, Springfield, VA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.


Publishers Weekly
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``The ugly marketplace of justice''--as one character terms the judicial process--is scrutinized with a riveting, you-are-there immediacy in the new legal procedural by the author of Compelling Evidence. When attorney Paul Madriani offers to assist a friend--the county's ailing district attorney, who subsequently dies--in investigating six brutal killings, he becomes entangled in a series of machinations that threaten his career and even his private life. Though Martini's plotting proves ingenious (the story is capped off by a nail-biting encounter in a darkened courtroom), the legal maneuvers themselves take center stage here. From the crime scene--the banks of California's Putah Creek--to a deceptively simple arrest to fascinating pre-trial scheming, Martini packs his novel with the quotidian details of the wheels of justice--and the numerous cogs therein. Madriani's first-person, present-tense narration invigorates the often intricate proceedings with first-rate wisecracks and one-liners. His character descriptions are by turns pithy and funny (frequently both): the prosecuting attorney ``looks like nothing so much as Robert Duvall's incarnation of the Great Santini''; the county's female victim-witness coordinator is ``the crime victim's answer to Don Corleone in drag . . . known as `Attila the Hen.' '' Prime is indeed the word for this involving read. (July) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved


Library Journal
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More courtroom drama, legal wrangling, and concentrated investigation arise from a series of double murders in a rural California college town. Special investigator Paul Madriani hustles to find the killer before he strikes a fourth time. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 3/1/93. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.


Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Defense attorney Paul Madriani (Compelling Evidence, 1992) signs on for a brief stint in the Davenport, California, prosecutor's office--then finds himself condemned to try a high-profile serial killing. Three couples have been murdered by somebody whose MO is distinctively grisly--they're staked to the ground with tent pegs, another peg driven through their hearts--but the third incident is different in enough ways (much older couple, different kind of rope, tent pegs not sharpened to a point) to suggest a copycat killer. Still, after Paul and his investigators turn up Andre Iganovich, a suspect for the first two pairs of murders, everybody--from Paul's impatient wife Nikki to the judges to the Davenport powers that be, even to Adrian Chambers, the venal defense attorney representing Iganovich, and certainly including the anonymous caller threatening Paul's family if he doesn't include the last two murders in the indictment--wants Paul to close the case by pinning all six crimes on Iganovich instead of continuing to search for the copycat. But Paul's determined to track down the missing witness to the last two murders, a man who has his own reasons for keeping quiet about why he was perched in a tree high above the fatal scene. The obligatory impossible obstacles--constant pressure from Paul's old nemesis Judge Armando Acosta; the incompetence and possible treachery of graying junior prosecutor Roland Overroy; an extradition mess when Iganovich flees the country; and the unprincipled enmity of Chambers, on the rebound from a disbarment arranged partly by Paul--come at Paul helter-skelter, without much rhyme or reason, until midway through the book, when the trial begins and Martini rolls up his sleeves to do what he does best. Not as twisty or deeply felt as Compelling Evidence, but not as overwrought either--and the unbelievable ending packs a satisfying punch. Good medium-grade beach fare.

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