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Set in fictional Piedmont City, North Carolina, with descriptions matching Charlotte and Hickory, BROTHER is a story of a family tobacco dynasty and local corruption that unwittingly draws in the FBI and Homeland Security. Chase Riordan is a young man who had worked for Ken Wall, the District Attorney. Having left under veiled circumstances Chase starts his own law firm where he has won an acquittal against murder charges for his first three clients. When Rufus Agnew, the former mayor of Piedmont City, is charged with murder and asks Chase to defend him, Chase begins to feel that these murders might have something in common. Though Chase’s life is busy he still finds time to visit his twin brother who is at a hospital recovering from wounds received in Iraq. The hospital is out in the countryside and Jared, Chase’s brother, is always drugged. When Chase starts to feel pain in different areas of his own body that match bandaged areas in Jared’s body, Chase realizes that they still have the special bonding they experienced in childhood. During their annual meeting at the seaside, Chase wants very much to share his concerns about his cases and his brother with old college buddies Lionel, Ev, Peter, and Randy, who also are like brothers to him. Instead he tells his concerns to Lionel’s sister, Reagan, whom Chase is secretly dating and who works for the FBI. When Chase is arrested in connection with the murders his former clients had been accused of, his friends must decide if they want to remain loyal to Chase and their special bond of brotherhood, or protect themselves. I felt the author was trying to create a group similar to David Baldacci’s delightful "Camel Club." However, the group in BROTHER was not fully fleshed out, nor sympathetic. The changes from Chase’s problems to his brother’s and friend’s problems were jolting. The examples of ESP that Chase and Jared have is interesting and worth more coverage in the story rather than the main storyline as written. On one occasion, the author has the coroner testifying to things he could not have known. ( “The young woman was at home, alone, but expecting company…. There’s a knock at the door…”) This appears to be the author’s first novel and, if so, shows a lot of promise. His topics are interesting – family dynasties, extra-sensory feelings between twins, and corruption in police departments. This was perhaps too ambitious for a first novel but a good read nonetheless.
Reviewed by Ginger K.W. Stratton, December 2008
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Contact: Yvonne Klein (ymk@reviewingtheevidence.com)
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