Publication Date May 23, 2023
Almost exactly two years ago, I read and reviewed Stacy Abrams’ novel While Justice Sleeps, in which we were introduced to Avery Keene, “…a brilliant young law clerk working for Justice Howard Wynn, a curmudgeon who is in failing health. Avery is doing her best to hold her life together, working long hours in a demanding job, while dealing with a messy family situation featuring her drug addict mother.
For some reason unknown to Avery, Judge Wynn names her his legal guardian and gives her his power of attorney, so when he falls into a coma, her life gets very messy very quickly. Avery soon discovers that Justice Wynn had been secretly researching a controversial case involving a proposed merger between an American biotech company and a genetics firm in India.” Terrific plotting, great characters, I pretty much loved it. I gave it four stars, and admitted that “...my rating of fewer than five stars is due to my own lack of knowledge of chess!”
Avery Keene is back in Ms. Abrams’ new novel entitled Rogue Justice, and she is trying to get things in her life back to what passed for normal after her efforts to deal with an international conspiracy in While Justice Sleeps. She is at a legal conference where she meets Preston Davies, a fellow law clerk working for a federal judge in Idaho (Avery works at SCOTUS). Preston is sure that his recently deceased boss, Judge Francesca Whitner, was being blackmailed shortly before she died. Along with a dire-sounding warning, he gives Avery a file and a burner phone, and his fear that dangerous people are involved.
Avery discovers that judges on the FISA Court (the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court), which grants permission to the government to wiretap Americans or spy on corporations suspected of terrorism, are on a list, and in danger, so she sets out to unravel the truth. So far, so good. But then the real world intruded on my thoughts, as headlines about the shocking corruption in Washington, D.C. in general and the U.S. Supreme Court in particular made me very concerned about the state of our democracy. Although I was enjoying Avery’s story, and I found the book to be (as expected) well written and filled with insider knowledge, I just kept having nightmares.
I have not yet finished it, and I’m not sure when I will be ready for it. TBH, my therapist recommended I give it a rest until I am less fearful. (God knows when THAT will be.) In the meantime, I recommend it for fans of legal thrillers, political intrigue, and intricate plotting, just as I did the first in the series. I look forward to more from Avery Keene and Ms. Abrams, although I am still puzzled about when Stacey sleeps! Thanks to Doubleday Books and NetGalley for providing me a copy of Rogue Justice in exchange for this honest review. Four stars.