Presumed Innocent [ペーパーバック]

I still pick up my battered paperback copy of "Presumed Innocent" from time to time and reread my favorite scenes, which probably speaks to the worth of Scott Turow's novel as much as anything. But ultimately I think the strength of this novel is that it works well on both parts of the law & order equation, that is to say, both in the courtroom in terms of the legal drama as well as outside where the detective elements come into play. At heart "Presumed Innocent" is a basic horror story, about a man who may be convicted for a crime he did not do. However, the twist here is that we are not sure if we believe our narrator, Rusty Sabich, once the fair-haired chief deputy prosecutor in the Kindle County D.A.'s office.

Rusty Sabich's boss, Raymond Horgan, is in a dogfight for the election with Nico Della Guardia, a former lieutenant. When one of their colleagues, Carolyn Polhemus, is found brutally murdered, Horgan gives Sabich the job. What Horgan does not know is that Sabich and Polhemus had been involved in an affair, which ended badly. Only Sabich's wife, Barbara, knows about the affair, and she has as much trouble dealing with her husband's obsession over the dead woman as she did with the affair. Sabich begins the investigation but there are no suspects, no leads, and no hope of finding the killer. But when Horgan loses the election, Sabich is stunned to find himself the new administrations one and only suspect for the Polhemus murder.

The fact that Sabich was a prosecutor becomes a key part of the legal dilemma in which our narrator finds himself. On the one hand he can piece together the prosecution's case based, but on the other hand Sabich is well aware of how what he does in defending himself can add to his legal problems, especially since without proof of the affair the prosecution is lacking a motive to tie the circumstantial evidence together. This last bit is crucial to the novel's dynamic because we have our own reasonable doubt about Sabich's innocent. Even if we do not know that Agatha Christie had a first-person narrator be the murderer in one of her classic mystery novels, we have to entertain doubts about Sabich: his finger print is found on a glass in the apartment, there was a phone call from his house to Polhemus that night, etc. Sabich has reasonable explanations, but there are too many of them for us not to think that something is wrong here.

Sabich, along with his friend Detective Lipranzer, is pursuing some ideas as to who would want to murder Polhemus and frame him for the crime. But in the courtroom it is defense attorney Sandy Stern who carries the legal burden of Sabich's defense; provided he can get his client to stop acting like an attorney during the trial. But then the presiding judge, Larren Lyttle, is perfectly willing to give Sabich every courtesy. Lyttle is a defendant's judge, who is most insistent that jurors in his courtroom presume the innocence of defendants. That is the good news. The bad news is that Sabich learns Lyttle might be deeply involved in his alternative theory of the case. In other words, the judge is a potential loose cannon.

For me the strength of "Presumed Innocent" remains what happens in the courtroom. Stern's cross-examination of the coroner, "Painless" Kumagai is a wonderful set piece. It is the sort of scene that makes you realize how few novels set in courtroom ever manage to come up with really first-rate scenes. But what makes this novel so compelling is how well it keeps us guessing as to not only whether or not Sabich did the murder, but also whether or not he will be convicted of the crime. Even when one of those questions is resolved, the other remains unresolved until the final chapters of the book.

Scott Turow has not written a novel as good as "Presumed Innocent," and it seems unlikely he ever will. This is not because of his lack of talent (certainly he has not flooded the market with his novels unlike Grisham), but simply because he may have committed the unpardonable sin of writing his greatest book first (as Richard Adams did with "Watership Down"). I could live with such a curse.

I just read a review on this site that made me wonder if that reviewer and I had read the same book. Her obvious disappointment with the characters and plot was sad to read. "Presumed Innocent" was a fascinating read I thought. Rusty Sabich is accused of murdering his colleague and, unbeknownst to his accusers, his ex-lover. He tells his own story, and if Scott Turow is a lawyer first, his career as a writer must follow a very close second. First person narrators are barely to be believed if they are telling their own stories. The fragmented technique used by Turow to tell Rusty's story has two vital uses. First, it reflects the state of his mind: he narrates in vivid flashback and in first person present. Rusty is a fragmented man himself. He is emotionally fragile and is being pounded on by elements he feels he cannot control. Rusty believes that he was in love with the dead woman and for the kind of man that he unfolds into being, this is not at all difficult to accept. He makes himself out to be quite dispassionate, but all his actions reveal that he is very passionate and needs to be around people who are as well. Watch out for storytellers who are promising to be objective and truthful. They rarely ever are and more lie in what they say about situations and others than in what they say about themselves directly. Also, this is a wonderful technique to leave the reader wanting more. Turow does not protect his reader from harsh realities in the world of a prosecuting attorney: rape, murder and violent acts. The seemingly large number of characters do not detract from Rusty's story, as they all have their roles to play in the telling. Fragmented narrators seem to feel the need to describe a lot of people around them so as to deflect attention away from themselves and this happens here too. Yet, Turow manages to make all his characters interesting and colourful: Rusty's emtionally distant wife, his politricking boss, his sauve defence lawyer, the larger-than-life judge, the sexy, know-what-she-wants-and-how-to-get-it ex-lover. They all have their stories and very dark sides. Turow may be a "real" writer, but he is not an insensitive one. Barbara Sabich may not be very likeable, but her love for her son is without question, as is Rusty's gentle and intense devotion to their child. The strange kinship between Rusty and his best friend, Dan Lipranzer, is sweet, without being cloying, and it makes you hope to have a friend like that. Turow allows the story to unfold easily and naturally, not hurrying to let things happen, so he keeps the reader in suspense. The investigation into the murder reveals more about others than it does about the accused and when characters begin to become worried about exposure, the book picks up. Flashbacks into Rusty's early career are raw and not for those with a weak stomach. The trial scenes are clear and there is one scene where Rusty's lawyer goes after a pathologist that makes you want to cheer. The film, although sound, didn't do justice the novel and should be read, if just to fill in the blanks. the ending is truly a suprise for a first reader, and not just discovering whodunnit. Turow's novel flows easily, keeps the reader interested and is definately unputdownable.

I just finished this book last night, at 2:30 am, less than four hours before I have to get up to go to work. It's that good. It took me two days to read the first third, and one day to read that last two-thirds....I could not put this book down. At the end, I felt like, I should have guessed who the murderer was, but I never had a clue. I even had to re-read the pages over again to make sure that what I was reading was real. Amazing how I, in the end, felt sadness for people I had loathed the whole time and then felt compulsions for people I originally felt sorry for. Nothing is as it seems and everyone is suspect. There were times when I actually laughed out loud at something a character said, and then felt like crying over some other scene. The words and characters just lept from the page.

It pains me to hear everyone say that this is the best of this kind, since I am just now returning to reading mysteries after years of "not having enough time." I want more! Please tell me that there are other books this exciting out there, because anything less will be too disappointing!