Rating: 
Summary: Life at St. Benedict's Has a Lot to Do With Death
Review: Reviewer Eleanor Miller has written a first rate review of this book which I agree with without reservation. I urge you to read it for a full presentation of what this book is about.I bring an interesting perspective to this book about an Episcopal priest who is charged with the murder of the Senior Warden of the parish and who is defended by an attorney who is a member of the choir. I happen to be an Episcopalian, an attorney, a member of the choir of my church and the Senior Warden. For that reason alone, I was interested to see where this story was going. Well, let's say first that Father Beale of this book is no Father Timothy, of Jan Karon fame. He has a temper, some say a "muderous" one, he is on the edge of many contentious issues that the Church is dealing with at this time, his vestry wants him to resign and he is an advocate for the Liberated Christian lifestyle. I'll let you read the book and see how that fits into the story. I found the book to be an interesting whodunit. You know it isn't Father Beale, but who the heck is it? That is revealed late in the book along with the presentation to the reader of a an issue that many may not have thought about before reading this book. I guarantee you will think about it afterwards. I leave it for you to find out what it is. Well worth reading!
Rating:
Summary: 4 1/2 stars
Review: See storyline above. Ben Kincaid, the Tulsa attorney, returns to the front, in one of Bernhardt's best novels yet. When it comes to legal thrillers, William Bernhardt now stands at the top of my list. With a writing style that pulls you into the plot, Bernhardt's story is well written and intense. With the surprises it holds, the reader is sure to be satified. Highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Pretty Poor
Review: This is my introduction to this author and his apparently recurring cast of characters, and it will be my last look in their direction. The characters are almost cartoonishly overdrawn and the plot is not horribly interesting, nor original. Life is much too short to waste time reading bad fiction. It may be that Mr. Bernhardt is capable of better, but I intend to avoid his writings like the plague.
Rating:
Summary: Pretty Poor
Review: This is my introduction to this author and his apparently recurring cast of characters, and it will be my last look in their direction. The characters are almost cartoonishly overdrawn and the plot is not horribly interesting, nor original. Life is much too short to waste time reading bad fiction. It may be that Mr. Bernhardt is capable of better, but I intend to avoid his writings like the plague.
Rating: 
Summary: Solid Writing Marred by an Ambiguous Premise!
Review: William Bernhardt is a past master at successfully turning red-hot issues into fictional pyrotechnics. As a long-time fan, I am pretty thoroughly convinced that his latest Ben Kinkaid legal thriller is probably the darkest and quite possibly the best-written novel to date in this incredibly solid series. Ben always allies himself absolutely with his clients, but Father Daniel Beale is a voice out of his past: a political-activist Episcopal priest who served as role model, mentor and friend during his unhappy childhood. Now Father Beale is in desperate trouble. Called to St. Benedict's in Ben's own Parrish, he has polarized the small church with his radical theories and practices, outraging the predominantly ultra-conservative members of his congregation. When Helen Conrad, a prominent member of the vestry, is found brutally murdered in the churchyard, although the police haven't enough evidence to charge him directly, even the suspicion of murder is final straw enough to bring him before an ecclesiastical court charged with 'conduct unbecoming a priest'. Ben manages to talk him out of that one, but then the murderer strikes again...and again...thereby enmeshing Father Beale in a web of circumstantial evidence from which there appears to be no escape. Now facing a civil court on a charge of murder one, Ben desperately battles for Father Beale's life against increasingly lengthening odds. The only hope seems to be for Ben and his colleagues to identify the real killer in time to prevent a terrible miscarriage of justice. Bernhardt's denouement? The stuff that nightmares are made of...incredible but factual...and drawn from real life. William Bernhardt is asking a lot from his readers with this novel. I believe that "Criminal Intent" is a brilliantly written book. It is a genuine thriller: a multi-faceted roller coaster ride of a read in terms of hard-hitting suspense and the almost unbearable human tensions implicit to the central characters' need to face and deal with bloody and brutal events which shock and appall all the more once their perpetrators are revealed. Speaking as objectively as I can, I admire Mr. Bernhardt's courage in tackling the diverse moral issues that concern his characters here and applaud the skill with which he develops some extremely ambiguous points of view reasonably and logically. However, although Ben seemed to come to terms with their complexities, I found myself genuinely repelled by much of what I was reading as well as extremely skeptical about one of this author's major plot premises: the plausibility of an aberrant behavioral pattern that Father Beale had apparently successfully imposed upon his congregation over a period of time. My inability to "willingly suspend (my) disbelief" and cope with what I can only see as an irreconcilable good priest/bad priest dicotomy marred much of the pleasure that I usually take from sharing Ben's world and regretfully made me wish on the whole that I'd ever decided to go there at all.
Rating:
Summary: Solid Writing Marred by an Ambiguous Premise!
Review: William Bernhardt is a past master at successfully turning red-hot issues into fictional pyrotechnics. As a long-time fan, I am pretty thoroughly convinced that his latest Ben Kinkaid legal thriller is probably the darkest and quite possibly the best-written novel to date in this incredibly solid series. Ben always allies himself absolutely with his clients, but Father Daniel Beale is a voice out of his past: a political-activist Episcopal priest who served as role model, mentor and friend during his unhappy childhood. Now Father Beale is in desperate trouble. Called to St. Benedict's in Ben's own Parrish, he has polarized the small church with his radical theories and practices, outraging the predominantly ultra-conservative members of his congregation. When Helen Conrad, a prominent member of the vestry, is found brutally murdered in the churchyard, although the police haven't enough evidence to charge him directly, even the suspicion of murder is final straw enough to bring him before an ecclesiastical court charged with 'conduct unbecoming a priest'. Ben manages to talk him out of that one, but then the murderer strikes again...and again...thereby enmeshing Father Beale in a web of circumstantial evidence from which there appears to be no escape. Now facing a civil court on a charge of murder one, Ben desperately battles for Father Beale's life against increasingly lengthening odds. The only hope seems to be for Ben and his colleagues to identify the real killer in time to prevent a terrible miscarriage of justice. Bernhardt's denouement? The stuff that nightmares are made of...incredible but factual...and drawn from real life. William Bernhardt is asking a lot from his readers with this novel. I believe that "Criminal Intent" is a brilliantly written book. It is a genuine thriller: a multi-faceted roller coaster ride of a read in terms of hard-hitting suspense and the almost unbearable human tensions implicit to the central characters' need to face and deal with bloody and brutal events which shock and appall all the more once their perpetrators are revealed. Speaking as objectively as I can, I admire Mr. Bernhardt's courage in tackling the diverse moral issues that concern his characters here and applaud the skill with which he develops some extremely ambiguous points of view reasonably and logically. However, although Ben seemed to come to terms with their complexities, I found myself genuinely repelled by much of what I was reading as well as extremely skeptical about one of this author's major plot premises: the plausibility of an aberrant behavioral pattern that Father Beale had apparently successfully imposed upon his congregation over a period of time. My inability to "willingly suspend (my) disbelief" and cope with what I can only see as an irreconcilable good priest/bad priest dicotomy marred much of the pleasure that I usually take from sharing Ben's world and regretfully made me wish on the whole that I'd ever decided to go there at all.
Rating: 
Summary: Mr. Bernhardt keeps the reader guessing until the end
Review: William Bernhardt is one of those guys who labors mightily and persistently despite not being a household name. He actually makes this work to his benefit. He can stretch a bit here and there, and take a chance or three that he might not otherwise be able to because he, at this stage, is not quite well known enough to have to live up to certain expectations. I'm not sure why he isn't better known --- his publisher certainly believes in him, and he can craft as a compelling a page turner as anyone. If one occasionally finds their suspension of disbelief sliding into "Hey, wait a minute" territory while reading his work, it certainly doesn't keep the pages from turning almost of their own volition. CRIMINAL INTENT is Bernhardt's latest work; Bernhardt takes a big chance here, combining the best elements of two tested subcategories of the mystery genre --- the legal thriller and the drawing room mystery. Whatever strengths and weaknesses Bernhardt's work might have, it is simply amazing how he can so seamlessly combine these elements and craft a work which keeps the reader guessing up to the last few pages while at the same time propelling the reader smartly along. On top of that, he presents an extremely unlikely suspect: Father Daniel Beale, an Episcopal priest who is not exactly the most likable of characters. He's managed to alienate at least half of his parishioners by dragging them, kicking and screaming, toward his view of what's what, with the result that his flock is inexorably straying toward other shepherds. When Beale is accused of murder, Attorney Ben Kincaid is there to see him through. Kincaid and Beale go back a long way, practically to Kincaid's childhood, and Kincaid is more than capable of seeing the good in the man. When yet another murder occurs, however, and Beale is caught literally red-handed, it seems all but certain that he is indeed the murderer. Kincaid does his best, but even his own client seems to be working against him. For there is much about Beale that Kincaid does not know. Surprise after devastating surprise awaits Kincaid as he attempts to defend Beale --- a task which, it appears, amounts to defending the indefensible. Bernhardt's fan base will undoubtedly consider CRIMINAL INTENT to be one of his best; certainly this is one of more compelling novels to be published by anyone this year. Kincaid is just offbeat enough, just eccentric enough, to be real and unclassifiable, and his supporting cast is interesting but never threatens to overshadow him. And if you've tried one of Bernhardt's novels in the past, but never returned to his work, CRIMINAL INTENT would be a good way to renew an old but unfulfilled acquaintance. This might be the one that puts Bernhardt's name, already on the map, in bolder letters. --- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
Rating:
Summary: Religious does not necessarily mean 'good'...
Review: You'd never guess from the title that the defense lawyer, Ben Kincaid, is going to be up to his neck in religious shenanigans...but he is. Unfortunately, in this case he is disappointed to find out how too fallible his religious guide/priest/whatever is. Bernhardt nicely involves a lot of different Christian denominations in this book...without saying anything nasty or prejudicial about them. Many people might think the little extracurricular activities that Father Holbrook engages in and also gets his congregation to engage in is not likely to happen. Unfortunately, during the 70's it happened probably all too often. Our church did not have a building of it's own so we borrowed other churches buildings (when they would let us). One time, my mom went into the current building we were using and came out all flustered because we were going to have a children's meeting, and said we couldn't do it. I won't name the denomination, but let's just say the took the idea of 'sensitivity sessions' too far, and my modest mother who was the head of the children's organization had to wait outside and tell everyone to head home. Needless to say, we changed buildings after that! So Bernhardt's idea isn't crazy, but it didn't make for enjoyable reading all the same. I was thrown off by who I thought was the villain of all the murders...I figured a certain somebody wanted his money sooner than later, and so had 'made arrangements.' Bernhardt's information about how many times people are found guilty of a crime, and then when new information comes out, it doesn't necessarily exonerate them or let them out of prison because of the way the justice system worked took me by surprise. I knew that DNA was helping to free some wrongly accused. You'd have to live in Siberia, not to read about someone being let free because of sloppy or prejudicial police work. I didn't realize how bad it was, and will be interested in reading more concerning this issue. The mystery was okay...just wasn't a good topic and didn't pack the urgency or good writing I come to look for in my mysteries... Karen SAdler
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