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Type of bind: Mass Market Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN num: 9780345450203
ISBN number: 0345450205
Label: Ballantine Books
Manufacturer: Ballantine Books
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 528
Printing Date: October 25, 2005
Publishing house: Ballantine Books
Release Date: October 25, 2005
Sale Popularity Level: 102581
Studio: Ballantine Books
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Product Description:
When the body of nine-year old Thuy Sen is found in the San Francisco Bay, the police quickly charge Rennell and Payton Price with her grisly murder. A twelve-person jury, abetted by an incompetent defense lawyer, is nearly as quick to find the brothers guilty, and to sentence them both to die for their crimes.
Fifteen years later, overworked pro bono laywer Teresa Peralta Paget, her husband Chris, and stepson Carlo, a recent Harvard law graduate, become convinced not only that Rennell didn't receive a fair trial but that he may well be innocent. Racing against the clock and facing enormous legal obstacles, Teresa, Chris, and Carlo desperately try to stay Rennell's execution, taking the case all the way to the Supreme Court, and to an enormously moving and powerful conclusion.
From the Hardcover edition.
User popularity level:
Rated by buyers -
As an attorney who has worked in criminal law, I found this book to be interesting from a technical point of view. I thought the court scenes were done quite well - the trials and the appellate arguments were exceptionally interesting (when in reality they are not). In fact, the very first 100 pages were a very quick read considering how many court scenes there were.
However, this book is also exceptionally preachy, one-sided, and I think unfair to those involved in criminal prosecution. This is tolerable when it is revealing of the thoughts of the protagonist (a death penalty attorney with an innocent client), but the writing slips out of her thoughts at numerous points in the books into omniscient diatribes on the death penalty.
It was the non-court scenes and the frequent "reflections" of the protagonist which slowed the book down to a crawl - I almost didn't finish it. Glad I did, the ending was appropriate and realistic - satisfying in a way where mysteries/suspense books aren't
Rated by buyers 
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There are absolutely strong arguments to be made against the death penalty and the near certainty that it has led to the government's execution of innocent men. Those arguments are totally and completely undermined by Conviction, a worthless mess of a novel that mercilessly and rabidly pounds into the poor reader Patterson's ultra-left agenda, never stopping along the way to be credible or tell an interesting story.
The world Patterson has created is one where professionals sit around and speak in platitudes that Law & Order's writers would be ashamed of. They ask ludicrously rhetorical questions to prompt responses such as "Welcome to the 'other America'," spoken with a straight face we are led to believe. This world is one where apparently everyone has been sexually abused at some point and the author seems to delight in constantly interrupting the story for another extended flashback sequence. It's one where the death penalty opponents are even-tempered, sympathetic, sage heroes and the other side (i.e. the conservatives) consists of raving, treacherous murderers lacking a soul or any tact. It's also one where the dialogue is so stilted, so consistently and abrasively preachy, that any pretense of this being a believable story is out the window. When the ending finally comes, Patterson handles the sequence well, but by this time it is completely predictable and in step with the tone of the entire book.
Throughout every sermonizing dialogue exchange about the "machine of death" you get the impression that Patterson is screaming at you through the pages--so loud that the story is no longer important, nor is it coherent or ever, at any point, compelling. Conviction is nothing more than a bloated amicus brief, Patterson's endeavor to beat everything he knows to be true into you with a large mallet. Hopefully no sensible thinker will form their death penalty beliefs on this, any more than formed their opinion on global warming from Michael Crichton's State of Fear. Forgive the obvious joke...but in all seriousness, trying to read this entire book is cruel and unusual.
Rated by buyers 
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This book started out with a good deal of promise in the very first third, but ended up falling far short of my expectations.
The story revolves around a family of lawyers who take up the case of Rennell Price, who was sentenced to death along with his brother Payton, for murdering a young girl. Price has only a few weeks left until his execution as the lawyers try to find a way to save his life, believing he is innocent of the crime. Their case rests on three claims - the very first that Price may be completely innocent based on an 11th hour confession of his brother and co-defendant, made only days before his own execution. The second is that even if guilty, Price is mentally retarded, and therefore not subject to the death penalty under recent case law from the US Supreme Court. The third is that Price received inadequate legal representation due to the fact his attorney at the time of his trial was a cocaine addict who was using the occasion of the trial to take the Price's guardian, his grandmother, for all she had in order to fuel his cocaine habit instead of providing a legal defense.
The book starts out very strong. The case that the lawyers must make is a tough one, and the author does a good job of presenting issues which should make death penalty supporters and opponents alike think about some very tough questions. What is the standard for mental retardation with respect to excluding an inmate from the death penalty on that basis? What is the standard for adequate or competent trial counsel? Most intriguing, what is the standard of proof for reversing a guilty verdict? Is it as little as introducing a reasonable doubt and thereby negating the reasonable doubt standard of proof required at trial? Or is it the other extreme, with the burden of proof now on the convicted to prove innocence beyond a reasonable doubt? Should the smallest prospect of exonerating evidence be enough to stay an execution, even one several years coming, because of the finality of the death penalty? And in all this, where does the people and victim's requirement for justice fit in?
Once these issues are raised, we expect to hear these arguments pored over, explored, and debated in heated legal battles. This is where the book falls flat. The author tries, but this never occurs because of the author's prejudices.
The author is clearly an anti-death penalty activist, and this ideology is evident throughout the book. About a third of the way through the book, we are subjected to a preachy lecture on all the reasons the death penalty is a bad thing as told through the viewpoint of the protagonists. From then on, the characters are lumped into categories - the anti-death penalty crowd who are portrayed and thoughtful, feeling moderates who are seeking justice, and the pro-death penalty crowd who are portrayed as blood-thirsty, callous ideologues who only care about winning and have no care or compassion for the condemned. The author's personal opinions prevent him from creating interesting, nuianced characters. Instead all the characters become uninteresting personifications of the stereyotypical opinions surrounding this issue.
Even the far left Ninth Circuit Court is portrayed as a pillar of judicial light among the incompetent and uncaring courts of the land.
The book further devolves into an virtual editorial on the politics of the day. Although the disclaimer in the front reads that this is a book of fiction and that any resemblance to real life is coincidental, the "coincidental" resemblances to real life are so obvious it's laughable. We have a California Governor who is facing a recall election with a "tough guy movie star" waiting in the wings (Grey Davis and Arnold Schwartzenegger?). The book (finished in 2004) contemplates a Kerry victory in the 2004 Presidential election and his subsequent appointment of a woman to the Supreme Court and to be Chief Justice. The name of the fictional president is Kerry Killcannon. It's also painfully obvious that the fictional Supreme Court is modeled on the Supreme Court of the time, with the evil right-wing death monger named Anthony Fini (Antonin Scalia) as well as a grey justice who is appointed despite many other grey jurists of more accomplishment, and who blindly follows Fini (Clarence Thomas).
This obvious prejudice of the author prevents him from arguing the pro-death penalty stance effectively at all. His right-wing characters are so one-dimensional and dull that there is no intellectually honest dialog or argument.
The author goes to great pains to paint the protagonists (and by extension himself) as genuine, caring people who are genuinely interested in justice rather than left-wing zealots. However, the true colors come shining through. Rennell Price's case for innocence revolves around a confession made by his brother, Payton mere hours before his ... Read More
Rated by buyers -
After I finished Patterson's last book on gun control (Balance of Power) and felt like I had been attending a lecture, I wasn't sure I would read any more of his books. I had always liked his legals thrillers, but I didn't like the preachy quality in Balance of Power. I was pleasantly surprised by the very first 1/2 to 2/3 of Conviction. Although it's a derisive issue - death penalty - and there is no question on which side of the debate Patterson falls, I thought the plot was intriguing and engaging.
Then the case gets to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals and it becomes a law school class. Having been through law school myself, I didn't enjoy the flashback to those days nor did I find it particularly interesting. The same was true as the case made it's way through the Supreme Court and the narrative completley forgot the main characters back in San Francisco. Although a non-fiction book about the inner workings of the Supreme Court might be interesting, a fiction book with this much legal detail (accurate or not) is tedious.
I won't say how it ends, but it does seem to end rather abruptly. The story lags for a long time in the court system and then just ends in a few pages.
I hope that Patterson eventually gets back to what he really does well - legal thrillers without all the legal education and soap box oration.
Rated by buyers -
The plot line was very similar to John Grisham's The Chamber, only this book was much more technical - lots more legal jargon. I had to skim parts because I was getting bored trying to wade through all of it. And speaking of legal jargon, the main female character was explaining legal concepts to her stepson that he should have learned on day one of law school! I realize that is the author's "tool" to explain those concepts to the reader, but it was hard for me to think it was credible that the character would not already know those things. I also think this book may be part of a series? I feel like I was missing lots of backstory and character development. But I don't know, So, it was good, but The Chamber was definately a more suspensful and character driven book.
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