Rating: 
Summary: Great Suspense, Highly Recommended
Review: The city of Chicago is shocked when their "saint of Lakeview Drive," Archbishop Richard Bernard Rushman, is brutally murdered in his own rectory.Nineteen year old Aaron Stampler is found crouched in a church confessional, covered in the bishop's blood, mumbling, "Didn't do it, Mama." Attorney Martin Vail is known for his rough tactics as well as his brilliant performances in the courtroom. He is hated by every prosecutor in the city. Vail loves and lives the law. Vail is forced to defend Aaron Stampler as sort of a "slap on the wrist." Aaron's Appalachian mountain accent and angelic appearance is only the beginning to a great defense. Author William Diehl hits the jackpot with this tale of murder and suspense. His characters are so real in their descriptions and dialog, it's easy to love and/or hate them. Great book to recommend.
Rating:
Summary: The Movie Scared Me
Review: The movie scared me, so I bought the book, which is the opposite of how I usually operate: book first, movie second. While I enjoyed the movie (Richard Gear in rare form!), I must say I like the book much better. There are quite a few thrills in it, psychological, visceral, and even sexual . . . (every man gets his turn with the nice country teacher, oh what fun). But this is no run of the mill thriller; the thing reads like it's actually true, and that is hard to do with such a far out plot. So I asked myself, How did William Diehl accomplish this? The answer is versimilitude. Put all of the spooky stuff aside, and you hold in your hands a well written legal investigation/courtroom drama. Diehl knows his way around the courtroom as well as the cigar smoke-filled political backrooms. Diehl's understanding of how the "game" is played--this is the backbone of the book, and while that is clicking on all cylinders, we are more likely to miss the occasional plot contrivance. A truly excellent book, down to the last word.
Rating: 
Summary: Primal Fear
Review: This book kept me riveted down to the VERY LAST SENTENCE (which blew my mind).
Rating:
Summary: Character's names reveal author's mindset?
Review: Having read the book and seen the movie, a very nasty thought popped into my head about the character Aaron Stampler. The name Aaron is a known Jewish name, hardly belonging to a Southern Catholic boy. Stampler is a German name, and one of its slang meanings is "to collect stamps", or "he goes stamping", which was used in WWII especially by the U-Boots (those Jews remaining in Germany without wearing yellow stars) to go about getting requisite ration stamps and so on. I.e., in dictatorial countries, that one goes about with an ID book listing address, workplace, children, etc. etc., every possible detail on your history, and for every change in your life you must get a permission stamp to do so, and pay a fine normally along with it. Is it possible that William Diehl chose this name for a boy pretending to be a sweet Catholic altar boy when in fact he was a murderous and angry man called Roy? Why not chose a name like John, James, Michael or Patrick, much more typical Catholic boys' names? Meanwhile, our ambitious lawyer is called Martin Vail. "Veil" is perhaps the wordplay intended, that this lawyer puts a veil on everything and finally, he gets his comeuppance when a veil is pulled off in front of his own eyes at the end. "Vail" may be the Americanization of the German name "Weill", as in Kurt Weill. That's my two bits! The rest of the reviews cover the basics.
Rating:
Summary: STUNNING LEGAL THRILLER
Review: Although William Diehl's "Primal Fear" is almost ten years old now, I did not have the good fortune to read it until this week. What a classic legal thriller!
The character of Martin Vail, although an obvious egotist who will do anything to win his case, is still a fascinating character, and his defense of the psychotic killer Aaron Stampler proves how cunning and brilliant he can be.
Although the obvious dark secret of the murdered archbishop is readily apparent, the way Diehl moves through the various clues is simply stunning. The other characters are likewise brilliantly executed and the courtroom scenes crackle with tension and surprises.
Of course, at the heart of this novel is the villain, Aaron Stampler. A seemingly cherubic and victimized young man, we find out a great deal about Aaron, his childhood, his teen years, and it is hard to believe that this mild-mannered young boy could brutally murder the Archbishop.
That's where the fun starts as Diehl wields a mighty sharp pen in this exceptionally good thriller.
Am anxious now to read the sequel, "Show of Evil."
Rating: 
Summary: No denouement
Review: No doubt Diehl is a master wordsmith, but based on this book, he is not a plot master. There is no denouement, no classical catharsis. In the end the villain wins--even Vail doesn't deserve that. Put another way, even though the protagonist (Vail) wins the court battle, he loses the existential battle, which is far more important. Some readers love this kind of ambiguous ending, obviously. I prefer the protagonist to be the clear winner.
Rating:
Summary: Definite page turner
Review: Probably the best book I've read all year. It kept me up all night - and the absoulte last line in the book was the best!!!
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant!
Review: The book is a masterpiece. I saw the movie version first, but when I read the novel, there was no hesitation when I decided that the book was much much better. It keeps you guessing till the end. I know this is a cliche, but it does. I started off thinking that I know what's going to happen next, but the course of events kinda altered my thinking. Archbishop, a "living saint", is killed and they caught the suspect red-handed. The prosecutor thought it was an open-and-shut case, only to be proven wrong. Aaron Stampler (that's the "killer") is backed up by a guilty but insane defense. In the movie, the judge (a lady) declared a mistrial, but in the novel, the judge (a guy) let the two lawyers work something out. The defense attorney, Martin Vail, is really cunning and clever, and so with his assistants. Apparently, Aaron was too smart for them - read about it in the book :-) All in all, the story is, lemme put it this way, something I'll always add to my carry-on on a trip.
Rating:
Summary: Closer to the truth than we care to know...
Review: When I first read PRIMAL FEAR I was most intrigued with how Stampler manipulated Vail into staging a split personality defense. Otherwise, the fact the late archbishop had been into making teen porno movies just seemed too unlikely and sensational for me to believe it. I even agreed with the Catholic anti-defamation folks who protested this aspect of the book for being just another attack on the priesthood overall. Three years after reading the book and seeing the movie, I became a member of a support group for people who've been sexually abused or exploited by clergy and now realize that the fictional archbishop's character is very much based on horrifying fact. Does this justify murder? No. But I feel I now owe Diehl an apology for my previous opinion of him and want to add that I think he is instead to be commended for having dared to write this. I'm also now wondering if he was ever victimized by a priest? A year ago, I was given brief access to a private website that had been put together by gay and pedophilic Roman Catholic priests, to serve as a kind of underground matchmaking service. It no longer exists after having been discovered by a group within the church that specializes in exposing internal corruption. What I saw of that website was as disgusting as anything Diehl had his fictional archbishop engaged in with his private moviemaking. For example, one fifty-someing priest related his pet fantasy as, "to be laying on a beach in the Caribbean with a naked 15-year-old boy in one hand and a bottle of Dom Perignon in the other." Consequently, I know Diehl's fiction is so close to the truth as to be terrifying.
Rating:
Summary: Give me more Adam S-S-S-Tampler please!!!!!!!!
Review: God what an awesome book!!!! Are you a James Patterson fan?! Did you read "Along Came a Spider"? Didn't you love Gary Soneji?! Well, move over Soneji..there is a better weirdo out there to rival you! Actually the main lawyer/prosecutor in this book, Martin Veil is ALOT like the love of my life, Alex Cross from the James Patterson novels. He's just white. Martin Veil is a swanky, smooth talkin' lawyer who decides to defend the angel-faced Adam Stampler (how angelic? he even studders)..from the accusations against him. Adam is an alter boy (awwwee!) accused of killing the bishop in his church. How could such a sweet little fella do such a thing? Well, through therapy it is discovered that Adam S-s-stampler has a split personality. Did he kill the bishop? who knows...I mean the Bishop WAS making porno movies using Adam and his friends, and, well studies do show that under such repetitive abuse, a personality CAN split. Martin Veil goes to work to find out more about his client and his friends...he himself cannot defend Adam if he beleives he's faking the split personality defense. Just what happens next will have you turning pages with rapid fire. AND WHAT AN ENDING!!!!! By the way, if you're like me and couldn't get enough from this book....two more follow it. Please do yourself a huge favor and see the movie AFTER you read the book. It's a fantastic trilogy...I hope they turn the other two books into movies too.
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