Joseph Antonelli is a member of a panel of legal experts on a television talk show. The other members are Julian Sinclair, a brilliant young law professor at the University of California, Daphne McMillan, an assistant district attorney in San Francisco, and Paula Constable, a defense attorney. The case they are discussing is transparently patterned on the Scott and Laci Peterson case.

Antonelli is bothered by the apparent rush to judgment on the part of the host and other panelists. He asks, “Would you want to be accused of a murder, a murder you did not commit, and have everyone convinced you must be the killer because everyone on television says you did?”

Later, Antonelli’s law firm explores asking Julian to leave Berkeley and enter private practice. To that end, Antonelli and a senior partner Albert Craven go to lunch with Julian. Antonelli, who sees something of his younger self in Julian, is impressed by – and a little envious of – the younger man’s intellect. Julian is interested in the offer because he is ready for a change.

Not long afterwards Antonelli gets an early morning call from Julian asking him to come to his house in the hills near Berkeley. Julian tells him that he awakened to find Daphne’s body in his living room; she had been brutally, viciously stabbed and slashed. Julian is covered with her blood but insists he didn’t kill her. They were in love, but she was married so their relationship was based on friendship. She was about to ask her wealthy, older husband for a divorce.

The authorities do not believe Julian’s protestations of innocence. He is arrested and charged with murder. Antonelli, who believes Julian’s account of the events, will defend him. Involving as it does those magic ingredients – sex and murder – the high-profile case becomes the fodder of television talk shows, and Antonelli faces the very horrific situation he’d theorized on television not long before.

As the trial nears, Antonelli fears that this is a case he may lose.

This is the seventh Joseph Antonelli novel. Over the course of the series, Antonelli has risen in his career to become a famous, successful defense attorney. Although the various novels are connected by the central character and similar in style – they all share the first person narrator point of view – they do not necessarily build on each other, and familiarity with earlier books is unnecessary.

Which is a good thing because it means that readers who haven’t followed Joseph Antonelli through the six previous books can dive right into this one without delay.

Fans of legal thriller will find everything they like in Trial by Fire: courtroom drama, sympathetic characters, heroic struggles, secret passions, and unexpected twists. It possesses a depth lacking in many plot-driven legal thrillers. In addition to the timely exploration of the media’s influence on legal proceedings, there’s also some reflection on the death penalty.

I have read the earlier Antonelli books and enjoyed them, but Trial by Fire is, in my opinion, the author’s best book so far. I couldn’t put it down: I couldn’t wait to see what happened and didn’t want it to end. I cannot recommend it strongly enough.

--Lesley Dunlap