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Rating: 
Summary: Come on in; the water is great.
Review: A review by (...):If you open a book and catch the sudden saltwater tang of the sea, chances are that John DeCure is at it again. In his new book, "Bluebird Rising," DeCure's surfing lawyer J. Shephard is back, and the legal waters are more treacherous than ever. As an attorney in dependency court, where cases involving child abuse, custody battles, and other family miseries, J. thought he'd seen everything. But his new job as a prosecutor for the California State Bar Association has opened his eyes to new and equally dark human debasements, this time involving corrupt and/or incompetent fellow lawyers, lawyers who are sometimes willing even to kill. "State Bar Association" has a friendly sound to it, as if it represented a friendly group of tavern owners. The only thing most people know about their state's bar is that it is responsible for making aspiring attorneys take really hard tests before they can be licensed to practice law. But the bar has more than exams and licenses on its mind. It is also charged with investigating and prosecuting corrupt lawyers. We travel with J. Shephard into a world rarely seen by the public, a world where justice is meted out to those who have deprived others of it. Through J., DeCure takes aim at a particularly vicious form of legal corruption: UPL, the unauthorized practice of the law. On the surface, a business involved in UPL can appear to the public--expecially to immigrants, the elderly, and the naive--as a perfectly legitimate enterprise. In this case, the Glendale Lo-Cost Law Center is "purportedly staffed by a cadre of crack paralegals who handled both the client contacts and the paperwork. Simple, low-cost stuff: Chapter 13 bankruptcy filings, wills, living trusts, burial instructions, name changes. Applications for green cards, amnesty, political asylum." The key is to get a "down-and-out lawyer" to lend his bar number to the scam, and once that number is obtained, the money starts to roll in. The con is that such fly-by-night law centers have no intention of providing the services for which their clients have paid. Once client complaints reach a critical mass, the pseudo law practice closes its doors, opens them elsewhere under another name, and starts all over again. A small minority of lawyers who wind up involved in UPL scams are not corrupt, and J. has run into one of those rare persons: Dale Bleeker, the man who inspired J. to take up the law, a man who was once a great prosecutor and is now a lawyer on probation for a "wienie-wagging incident," a man who has lost his wife, alienated his daughter, and now lives out of his car. A man with an alcohol problem and a desperation so great that he didn't recognize a UPL until he was deeply enmeshed in it. J., faced with his fallen hero, embarks on a crusade to free Bleeker from the criminal mess that he has inadvertently gotten himself into: "I briefly considered telling him about how hardcore certain UPL practitioners can be . . . How just last summer, an unwitting lawyer hired into a San Jose UPL operation had . . . exposed his employer when he found out what was going on. The next morning he was shot twice in the head, execution-style, in a supermarket parking lot." But Dale Bleeker and the UPL are not J's only problems. His fiance Carmen and her younger brother Albert, who has Down's Syndrome, have just moved into J.' home in the beach town of Christianitos, and the adjustment period is not going well. When Albert gets jumped by some surfside thugs, and J.'s old surfing buddy starts putting the moves on Carmen, and J's office begins an internal audit that seems to have him in its sights, J's world begins to spin out of control. Once again, it is surfing that saves him. J.'s passionate love of the ocean anchors his life. Surfing is the sun at the center of his universe around which all other things revolve. When DeCure turns loose and describes a sunset break or a deserted dawn set, his prose can be as pumped or as lyrical as that of Kem Nunn, another great surfing writer: "But really, if you ride waves with any seriousness about the act itself, you do it to catch that familiar--if fleeting--feeling, the adrenaline-buzz high you get from a rail-to-rail, wind-whistling magic-carpet-ride speed dance along a meadow-green wall of point-wave bliss. From whipping a tight power-carve in the sweet spot just under the cascading lip--thwack!--like a fulcrum grinding a mill wheel or a revolutionary cracking a Liberty Bell . . . From locating an inner peace you didn't even know you had through the exercise and discipline of sustained intense concentration. And, probably most of all, from just having a kick-ass good time." And then there is the lyricism: "I looked back a final time, studying the ocean's movements for a hint of what the morning might bring. White water slapped against the pier like silent shell bursts, but the Northside wave zone with its ubiquitous pack of surfers was hidden behind the big houses in the sand. Farther out, in deeper water, a dark lump of swell rolled through proud and unimpeded, a big blueibird gathering energy for its final push. Tomorrow, swell permitting, I might find an hour to slip out there beyond the others, to sit and rest and sort my thoughts and say a small prayer for the future, and wait, eyes scanning every shift and pulse and undulation, muscles twitching at the sea's first whisper of a new beginning." Need I say more? Read this book and enjoy. (...)
Rating:
Summary: Come on in; the water is great.
Review: California lawyer J. Shepard would prefer to surf than work the legal system, but he understands that he needs money to ride the waves. However, the ocean is on hold when Dale Bleeker pays a visit on J. Dale, at one time, was the superstar of the prosecution world until he committed an embarrassing faux pas that has made him persona non grata amidst the state Bar. J would rather ignore the apparent alcoholic, but Dale gave him the lift that established his career ten years ago. Though concerned that good Samaritans get burned, J helps his former mentor. However, the mess is worse than he imagines as J finds himself in the midst of an unauthorized practice of law (UPL) scenario. Even more dangerous is that those avaricious souls willing to use and dispose of Dale and now J are ready to commit a homicide or two. The keys to this legal thriller are the intelligent, amusing California mellow dude J and the two humorous California Girls that support the lead protagonist. Surprisingly, the surf sidebars seem more of an undertow than the enhancement that this provided to the first tale (see REEF DANCE). Still, the legal look at UPLs and the subsequent assault in court, on the beach, and in the street at J and Dale make for surf's up time for readers. Harriet Klausner
Rating: 
Summary: fine legal thriller
Review: California lawyer J. Shepard would prefer to surf than work the legal system, but he understands that he needs money to ride the waves. However, the ocean is on hold when Dale Bleeker pays a visit on J. Dale, at one time, was the superstar of the prosecution world until he committed an embarrassing faux pas that has made him persona non grata amidst the state Bar. J would rather ignore the apparent alcoholic, but Dale gave him the lift that established his career ten years ago. Though concerned that good Samaritans get burned, J helps his former mentor. However, the mess is worse than he imagines as J finds himself in the midst of an unauthorized practice of law (UPL) scenario. Even more dangerous is that those avaricious souls willing to use and dispose of Dale and now J are ready to commit a homicide or two. The keys to this legal thriller are the intelligent, amusing California mellow dude J and the two humorous California Girls that support the lead protagonist. Surprisingly, the surf sidebars seem more of an undertow than the enhancement that this provided to the first tale (see REEF DANCE). Still, the legal look at UPLs and the subsequent assault in court, on the beach, and in the street at J and Dale make for surf's up time for readers. Harriet Klausner
Rating:
Summary: Bluebird Rising is more than a mystery
Review: Really enjoyed Bluebird Rising. Noticed on the book's jacket that Michael Connelly liked this author, so I tried it and agree. While many mysteries are purely plot-driven, this one rises above because there's more attention devoted to interesting characters, a glimpse of the surfing scene in So Cal, some courtroom action, etc. Continues with the character, Jay, you meet in the first book, Reef Dance, which I also enjoyed.
Rating: 
Summary: Slow-moving and confused
Review: This novel is written well, but the protagonist, a young (I think) lawyer involved in disciplining other lawyers and facing dissatisfaction with his own ethics, seems to have too many things going on to make for a neat or fast-paced adventure yarn. This, coupled with his having to take time out to go surfing and expatiate on the pleasures of that pastime, drags things down a good bit.
Maybe there are too many characters, or too little action, or too much exposition of legal procedures (the author is a lawyer) to make this one stick in my mind at all.
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