Booklist Reviews
A woman living in Florida illegally is turned in to the immigration department by a man bearing a grudge. The woman is put into a detention center; her teenage daughter barely escapes and hides out at her aunt's house; Jack Swyteck, the lawyer who's toplined Grippando's series of smartly written legal thrillers, hears about the situation from his grandmother and signs on, free of charge, to help get the girl's mother released. But here's the problem: the mother is making accusations that are very hard to prove, against people who have very strong reasons for wanting certain secrets to stay buried, and Jack's own safety, not to mention his family's, is soon in jeopardy. Grippando, a former attorney, has the legal stuff down cold, and his writing style is impeccable (he won the 2017 Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction for Gone Again, a Jack Swyteck novel). This would be a perfect time for legal-thriller fans who haven't yet checked out this series to join the crowd. Copyright 2018 Booklist Reviews.
Kirkus Reviews
Miami attorney Jack Swyteck battles to save an undocumented Salvadorian immigrant caught between the abusive husband she fled and the majesty of the U.S. government. Barista Julia Rodriguez's job at Café de Caribe ends the moment she emphatically rejects the advances of cafe manager Duncan McBride, who promptly dimes her out to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Only Julia's heroism and quick thinking prevent her 14-year-old daughter, Beatriz, from being swept up along with her. Brought to Jack's attention by her aunt, Cecelia Varga, and Jack's grandmother, Beatriz only wants to be reunited with her mother. But that's one tall order, as Jack (A Death in Live Oak, 2018, etc.) quickly learns. Julia's not eligible for asylum because she was charged with a felony back in El Salvador: aborting the baby who was the product of one of the many rapes she suffered at the hands of her husband, brutal gangster Jorge Rodriguez. Flexing his muscles in court, Jack gets Julia released from detention just in time for her to discover Duncan McBride's corpse in her bathtub. Small wonder that Beatriz, faced with her mother's reimprisonment, withdraws into a life-threatening case of resignation syndrome, leading to an ugly paradox: an immigration judge orders Julia released until Beatriz's health improves, but as soon as it does, Julia's detained again even though the price will be Beatriz's relapse. Working with his old buddy Theo Knight, Jack makes two trips to El Salvador, but what he learns there just deepens his client's peril, which turns on another paradox. There's every indication that Jorge Rodriguez has followed Julia to the U.S., but his presence there, if he really is there, undermines her case for asylum, which depends on the argument that she'd face imminent danger back in El Salvador, even as it puts her in clear and present danger here and now. Grippando is equally skillful at ratcheting up the tension and plucking at your heartstrings. Only t h e ending, which acknowledges just how intractable the plight of undocumented immigrants has become, is a letdown. Copyright Kirkus 2018 Kirkus/BPI Communications. All rights reserved.
Library Journal Reviews
In this timely new thriller from the 2017 winner of the Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction, Julia Rodriguez and her teenage daughter have fled violence both gang-related and domestic in El Salvador and landed in Miami. An anonymous tip leaves Julia awaiting deportation, with Miami attorney Jack Swyteck thinking that asylum (now so tricky) is her only option. With a 75,000-copy first printing.
Copyright 2018 Library Journal.Library Journal Reviews
In Grippando's latest "Jack Swyteck" thriller (after
Publishers Weekly Reviews
Julia Rodriguez, an undocumented immigrant from El Salvador, works as a barista in a Miami café, in bestseller Grippando's timely 16th Jack Swyteck novel (after 2018's