Jake McCarthy, Ironwood

Rating:
Summary: Lawyer book for Lawyers
Review: Excellent book! As a law student, I spend a good portion of my waking hours reading. I get to read casebooks, statutes, and treatises - and the last thing I want to do with my sparse amound of free time after reading all of that is read a book about a lawyer in my spare time. That is, until I met Jake McCarthy. Mr. Baldwin has put together a legal mystery thriller that is simple, fun, and fast to read. The plot speeds along and kept me interested. The characters were sophisticated, but not so sophisticated that I had to spend a lot of time keeping them straight. I was able to finish the book inbetween reading for class over a week. Most legal thrillers are too long, and too complicated to keep straight while keeping my legal studies straight.

Mr. Baldwin has managed to pack action, debauchery, legal prowess, and international intrigue into a concise, fun book. The plot is tight and well thought out, and the descriptions of the setting are excellent. In addition, the weaving of the Souteast Asian and Midwest Indian cultures is creative and well-done. Mr. Baldwin seems to have thought it all through in creating this piece. I would recommend this book to anybody who wants to read a Tom Clancy-esque thriller but doesn't think they have the time.

Rating:
Summary: Lawyer book for Lawyers
Review: Excellent book! As a law student, I spend a good portion of my waking hours reading. I get to read casebooks, statutes, and treatises - and the last thing I want to do with my sparse amound of free time after reading all of that is read a book about a lawyer in my spare time. That is, until I met Jake McCarthy. Mr. Baldwin has put together a legal mystery thriller that is simple, fun, and fast to read. The plot speeds along and kept me interested. The characters were sophisticated, but not so sophisticated that I had to spend a lot of time keeping them straight. I was able to finish the book inbetween reading for class over a week. Most legal thrillers are too long, and too complicated to keep straight while keeping my legal studies straight.

Mr. Baldwin has managed to pack action, debauchery, legal prowess, and international intrigue into a concise, fun book. The plot is tight and well thought out, and the descriptions of the setting are excellent. In addition, the weaving of the Souteast Asian and Midwest Indian cultures is creative and well-done. Mr. Baldwin seems to have thought it all through in creating this piece. I would recommend this book to anybody who wants to read a Tom Clancy-esque thriller but doesn't think they have the time.

Rating:
Summary: Critique
Review: Recently I read a book by Jerry Baldwin titled Jake McCarthy, Ironwood. Jerry Baldwin is the non-de plume of Jeff Page. Jeff is a practicing attorney in Bloomfield Hills, is married and is a retired Colonel, USAF Reserve.

This is a great book and you should read it The book is interesting and enjoyable and I am presenting below a critique on this novel.

The entire novel flowed smoothly item one to two to three.

I loved the description of the lawyer's life, his work, his problems of matching work time and family time. Somewhat of a page out of John Grissoms' The Client.

The plot started small, the head lawyer wanted Jake McCarthy to go to Ironwood and help out his friend. Not to significant a start (not a blast for sure) but interesting.

I loved the interplay between Jake and his wife Maggie. You could imagine that such a situation could happen to you. The description of sex with Maggie could be your life or mine. Busy office workers and not too exciting sex by the 'lets just do it' couple.

At Ironwood the introduction of the daughter Michelle and the description of her could be the beginning of a cute sex plot. But no. Our hero does not do the deed with her. Instead, he does do the Judge's clerk Sarah, an FBI agent in disguise. I had trouble with that, because I felt FBI agents don't do the deed in a work situation and the likely candidate for the deed was Michelle. So there.

There were a lot of great descriptions of Ironwood, areas of the UP, Hurley, and the Trading Post to mention a few. Great local color. Jeffrey Baldwin might be the new Elmer Dutch Leonard and the author of the Rosary Murders who I believe is Francis X McKenzie.

We did get a lot of descriptions of the paper, writ, documents, etc on how the lawyer got his client out of jail. Interesting although to me rather technical.

Jake's disputes with the local police, especially Capt Dent were interesting. The book certainly had a lot of local color.

Then there was the situation of Michelle and the hot tub, and the Asian woman preparing a man for the bath. Interesting.

Then we were treated to descriptions of Hurley and Silver Street. One would have to accept that such towns and districts of vice do exist. Certainly an eye opener, in fact possibly the description of the Silver Street district was an effort to present a sell on the advantageous of a regulated organized vice district.

An interesting sub plot, the wife flew off to Boston with the kids to be with her parents. Appears a bit of domestic strife but just a hint. Just a hint, nothing heavy. To beef up the action, could have a heavy sub-plot on the domestic strife issue.

Later on in the book, we are exposed to the issue of the FBI setting up an undercover operation in the UP based on the item that a report of an Asian agent is in the area. Hmmm. I felt that that item needed more beef before one could accept the establishment of an undercover operation.

Now, on the first indication that Norton's house had been entered and the alarm deactivated, one might suspect that Norton might inform his buddy, the Indian Chief, and the Indians would establish a guard perimeter.

The descriptions of the baddies in Vietnam and the bad agents and the torture were very good. Its like you were there. How could the wife Angela resist the torture?

Then there was a great description of the hooker Gloria, her life and how she operated. Very realistic.

The entire plot flows 1 to 2 to 3 etc. The novel is easy and comfortable to read.

The ending was good. Realistic.

Some of the modern authors, for instance Mario Puzo who wrote The Fourth K issued around 1990 which I am now reading as I have access to a Senior Center free library has a different motif than Ironwood. The book starts off with a bang section/chapter, and then throughout there are plots here and there. The starting bang and the here and there plots (I even think the author invents plots just to keep you guessing and reading as to how they fit in) are calculated to stimulate reader interest...