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WORK TITLE: RICH JUSTICE
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE: https://robertbaileybooks.com
CITY: Huntsville
STATE:
COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
LAST VOLUME:
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born in Huntsville, Alabama; married, wife’s name Dixie Bailey: children: two sons and one daughter.
EDUCATION:Davidson College, B.A. (history); University of Alabama Law School.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Civil defense trial lawyer.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
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Robert Bailey writes legal thrillers, and is best known for his “McMurtie & Drake Legal Thrillers,” “Bocephus Haynes” and “Jason Rich,” series. Born in Huntsville, Alabama, and a University of Alabama football fan, he works as a civil defense trial lawyer in his hometown.
Bailey began his “McMurtie & Drake Legal Thrillers” series with The Professor, in which young lawyer Rick Drake takes the case of a freight carrier involved in a trucking accident and uncovers secrets, arson, bribery, and a cover-up. For help in the case, he consults his law school mentor, Professor Thomas Jackson McMurtrie, who wrangled with a power-hungry colleague that cost him his teaching position at the University of Alabama School of Law.
In the second book, Between Black and White, retired professor McMurtrie takes the case of his former student, African American lawyer Bocephus Haynes, who is the prime suspect in the murder of Andy Walton, a Ku Klux Klan member who led the lynch mob 45 years ago that murdered his father. McMurtrie teams up with his young partner Rick Drake to hunt down the real killer while they fight the wrongful death lawsuit. Writing in Southern Literary Review, Claire Hamner Matturro praised Bailey for avoiding a stale, mechanical plot but also offer something new, exciting, and fresh. “This Bailey does, and does with a bang…just when the reader settles back to relax and believe that justice has been achieved, something complicated, violent and utterly surprising happens.” A reviewer in Small Press Bookwatch remarked that the book was “A gripping legal suspense thriller of the first order.”
Lawyer Bocephus Haynes features in his own “Bocephus Haynes” series. In Legacy of Lies, widower Bo, the only African American litigator in Pulaski, Tennessee, works on the case of District Attorney General Helen Lewis, who is arrested for the murder of her ex-husband. In book 2, The Wrong Side, Bo swears off criminal work, but reluctantly takes the case of Odell Champagne, his son’s best friend, star high school running back, and prime suspect in the murder of Odell’s girlfriend Brittany Crutcher, a teen pop star, who earned many enemies in the last hours of her life. The hopeless case could be the end of Bo’s career. “Bailey expertly ratchets up the suspense as the plot builds to a surprise punch ending,” noted a reviewer in Publishers Weekly. A Kirkus Reviews critic wrote: “Social tensions redoubled by race intensify a workmanlike mystery.”
Bailey’s “Jason Rich” series launched with Rich Blood. Alcoholic, accident chasing injury lawyer Jason Rich must learn the sophisticated ways of criminal law after his estranged sister, Jana, is accused of paying $15K to a handyman to murder her husband. Jana’s involvement with drug kingpin Tyson Cade complicates matters. “Bailey conscientiously sweats the details all the way to a dazzling but not entirely persuasive double-twist ending,” reported a Kirkus Reviews writer. In Rich Waters, Jason Rich is given an offer he can’t refuse when drug lord Tyson Cade makes him defend a former high school football star, Trey Cowan, accused of murdering Sgt. Kelly Flowers, Cade’s inside man on the county’s police force. A Kirkus Reviews critic commented: “a compelling dive into the life of a lawyer out way past his depth.” In Rich Justice, Jason himself is now charged with murder when drug kingpin Tyson Cade is gunned down in a grocery store. Jason asks disgraced lawyer and old adversary Shay Lankford to represent him. Jason and Lankford root out the city’s secrets and scandals. “Sturdy legal thrills for readers willing to go the distance with a flawed hero in an even more flawed world,” according to a contributor to Kirkus Reviews.
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BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Kirkus Reviews, June 1, 2021, review of The Wrong Side; June 15, 2022, review of Rich Blood; May 1, 2023, review of Rich Waters; March 15, 2024, review of Rich Justice.
Small Press Bookwatch, March 2016, review of Between Black and White.
Publishers Weekly, February 17, 2020, review of Legacy of Lies; August 31, 2020, review of The Golfer’s Carol, p. 33; June 21, 2021, review of The Wrong Side, p. 112.
ONLINE
Robert Bailey homepage, https://robertbaileybooks.com (April 25, 2024).
Southern Literary Review, https://southernlitreview.com/ (April 18, 2016), Clair Hamner Matturro, review of Between Black and White.
Robert Bailey
USA flag
Robert Bailey was born in Huntsville, Alabama, the son of a builder and a schoolteacher. From the time he could walk, he's loved stories, especially those about Coach Paul Bear Bryant and his beloved Alabama Crimson Tide football team.
Robert obtained a Bachelor of Arts in History from Davidson College in North Carolina. Law School at the University of Alabama followed, where Robert made Law Review, competed on the school's trial team and managed to watch every home football game.
For the past thirteen years, he's been a civil defense trial lawyer in his hometown of Huntsville. He's married to the incomparable Dixie Bailey and they have two boys and a little girl.
Genres: Mystery, General Fiction
New and upcoming books
May 2024
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Rich Justice
(Jason Rich, book 3)
Series
McMurtie & Drake
1. The Professor (2014)
2. Between Black and White (2015)
3. The Last Trial (2018)
4. The Final Reckoning (2019)
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Bocephus Haynes
1. Legacy of Lies (2020)
2. The Wrong Side (2021)
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Jason Rich
1. Rich Blood (2022)
2. Rich Waters (2023)
3. Rich Justice (2024)
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Novels
The Golfer's Carol (2020)
Robert Bailey is the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of the Jason Rich series, the McMurtrie and Drake legal thrillers series, the Bocephus Haynes series, and the inspirational novel, THE GOLFER’S CAROL.
Robert was born in Huntsville, Alabama, the son of a builder and a schoolteacher. From the time he could walk, he’s loved stories, especially those about Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant and his beloved Alabama Crimson Tide football team.
Robert obtained a Bachelor of Arts in History from Davidson College in North Carolina. Law School at the University of Alabama followed, where Robert made Law Review, competed on the school’s trial team, and managed to watch every home football game.
For the past twenty-two years, he’s been a civil defense trial lawyer in his hometown of Huntsville, where he lives with his wife, kids, and beloved menagerie of pets.
FAQ: https://robertbaileybooks.com/faqs/
WINSTON
September 18, 2020
In 2012, I was trying to get my first novel, The Professor, published and my agent, Liza Fleissig, recommended that I try to obtain a blurb from a big name author. I sent hundreds of emails and website requests to my writing heroes. As an unpublished writer without a book under contract, it was a tremendous shot in the dark, and almost every single author I queried at that time said no. All were very nice about it, but most bestselling authors have a huge stack of books that actually have a publisher that they are being requested to blurb. I knew the chances of getting a blurb were very slim, but I still asked.
After over a hundred rejections, one author said yes.
Winston Groom.
I knew Winston then as the author of Forrest Gump, one of my favorite novels and my very favorite movie of all time. He was a legend. I figured there was no way he would even respond to my request. But he did. And one week later, I had the blurb that eventually donned the cover of The Professor.
When I reached out to Winston, we were so close to breaking through. Several times, we got as far as the boardroom of a publishing company, where editors who liked the story had pushed things to a vote and a decision had to be made. But the answer kept coming back no. All we needed was a push. A nudge. A break.
Winston Groom was that push. He did that for me without ever meeting me. Without knowing me. And without me having a publisher. It was the break of a lifetime.
I met Winston a few months after he gave me his wonderful blurb. We were in Point Clear for the State Bar Meeting, and he invited my wife, Dixie, and I to his house for a drink and then to dinner. He was an incredibly gracious host and it was a pinch me moment for me to hear him talk about his trials as a young writer. Since then, on several return trips to Fairhope, we were able to connect with him, and he was always kind and generous with his time.
Last December, Winston was nice enough to offer a blurb for The Golfer’s Carol. As with The Professor, Winston’s words will again grace the cover.
I learned yesterday that Winston had died. He had an incredible life and touched so many people in a positive way with his words and actions. He created a fictional character, Forrest Gump, that will live forever. His early novels were critically acclaimed as were the histories he wrote in later years. He was an icon in the state of Alabama. A beloved figure in Fairhope and all over the world. And one of the damn finest people I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing.
Winston taught me a couple of lessons that I have shared with prospective writers and readers in my book talks over the years. First, you never know what someone will do for you unless you ask. Second, in the writing world, which is full of a thousand “no’s,” all it takes is one “yes,” that can change your stars.
Thank you for saying “yes,” Winston. Thank you for being so gracious to me and my family.
You will be missed.
Published On: 12.18.22 |
By: 42887
Meet Alabama legal thriller author Robert Bailey
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Robert Bailey, a Huntsville lawyer, has sold more than a million books, mostly legal thrillers. His ninth novel will be published in June. (Courtesy of Robert Bailey)
He started out as a smart aleck. Robert Bailey sat through his law school classes wondering whether his professors could succeed in an actual court of law. After becoming a lawyer, Bailey wrote an 800-page thriller about an aging professor called to work a trial. After honing it down to the real kernels of the story, he sold a two-book deal to a publisher. Now, with more than 1 million books sold, Bailey is releasing his ninth book in June.
For “The Professor,” Bailey worked eight years to learn to write a successful thriller novel. Inspired by a creative writing course at Davidson College in North Carolina and Stephen King’s book “On Writing,” Bailey decided to give it a shot. While maintaining a demanding law career and a family with three children, he rose every morning at 4 a.m. to pursue his dream.
“At first, I heard a lot of noes and felt pretty dejected. Then, I basically applied the 10,000-hour rule. By the second book, I was better at setting up scenes – using less thinking and more action,” says Bailey, referring to the theory in “Outliers: The Story of Success” by Malcolm Gladwell.
Alabama’s Robert Bailey has built a following with his legal thrillers. “Rich Blood” features ambulance-chasing lawyer Jason Rich, as does the forthcoming “Rich Waters.” (contributed)
It was his second book, “Between Black and White,” that got the yeses rolling in. After receiving three callbacks, he chose his current agent. A big boost launched him in 2002 when “Forrest Gump” author Winston Groom wrote a blurb for one of his books. He hit pay dirt when “The Wrong Side,” a story about the murder of a teenage pop star, rose to the best-seller list at the Wall Street Journal.
The Huntsville native grew up spending time on a family farm in Hazel Green. His father cheered for the Crimson Tide, referring to Paul “Bear” Bryant as “The Man.” In “The Professor,” it is the coach who persuades the protagonist, a member of the 1961 UA football team, to return to teach in the law school.
“I grew up on football, yes ma’am, no ma’am, and Bear Bryant. His death was announced over the loudspeaker at my school. He was a mythic figure – guys who played for him talked about him with such reverence. The aura of winning was something people wanted to be a part of,” Bailey says.
It was another larger-than-life character who influenced his decision to become a lawyer: Atticus Finch, the hero of “To Kill a Mockingbird.” He joined Lanier Ford Law Firm in 1999, after he graduated from the University of Alabama School of Law. He defends insurance companies in mostly personal injury cases, which led him to create his current series protagonist, Jason Rich, a classic ambulance chaser. “Rich Blood” put the man who advertises on billboards as “Get Rich,” in a moral struggle. “Rich Waters,” his upcoming book, places Rich at Lake Guntersville. The combination of a charming small town with a placid lake and inherent danger at Sand Mountain and a fictional meth trade sets the stage for a family-driven thriller.
A personal favorite of Bailey’s is “The Golfer’s Carol.” Straying far from his thriller books, this novel is a combination of “It’s a Wonderful Life,” “A Christmas Carol” and “Field of Dreams” meeting on a golf course. The novel sprang from a time when his father was dying and his wife was diagnosed with cancer. Released on Election Day during the pandemic, the novel inspires hope through tough times. Writing four life-changing lessons in the book allowed Bailey to mourn his father, a storyteller who kept his kids on the edge of their seats between bouts of laughter.
Bailey believes in capturing his audience through emotion. “No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader,” he says. He confesses the process gives him “a buzz” when the words flow from brain to fingers to screen. He already has a new idea for his next book in the Rich series.
“The character of Jason Rich has a lot of meat on his bones,” Bailey says.
Thomas & Mercer and Putnam are Bailey’s publishers. His books can be found on Amazon and at Barnes & Noble.
This story originally was published by the SoulGrown website.
How this Alabama-based author sold a million books
Updated: Sep. 02, 2022, 3:27 p.m.|Published: Sep. 02, 2022, 1:54 p.m.
Alabama author Robert Bailey
Alabama author Robert Bailey is known for his legal-thrillers. (Courtesy Robert Bailey)
By Matt Wake | mwake@al.com
There’s this little notebook Robert Bailey writes ideas into. A while back, he wrote down something like, billboard attorney in an out-of-their-wheelhouse type of case. He thought it might be interesting to explore “that type of law, that type of personality.”
The note bloomed into Bailey’s latest legal-thriller, “Rich Blood.” Out this week, the tome centers around Jason Rich, an ambulance-chaser who’s reeling personally and facing his biggest legal challenge yet.
“I wanted to do something with a character that had some flaws and skeletons in the closet,” Bailey says. “Somebody that was kind of a scoundrel, but by book’s end readers will want to root for.”
Alabama author Robert Bailey
Cover art for Alabama author Robert Bailey's book "Rich Blood." (Courtesy Thomas & Mercer/Amazon Publishing)
“Rich Blood,” published by Thomas & Mercer, an Amazon Publishing imprint, is Bailey’s eighth book. His titles have amassed more than a million in total sales. That number’s particularly impressive since writing isn’t his day job. For nearly 20 years, Bailey has been a civil defense trial lawyer in Huntsville.
“So much of being a lawyer, especially trial lawyers, is storytelling,” Bailey says. “It’s just with the real facts instead of (in fiction-writing ) facts you make up, so there’s a lot of synergy between the two professions. That’s probably why so many lawyers end up becoming fiction writers.” Lawyers turned successful scribes include the likes of Meg Gardiner, Scott Turow and, most famously, John Grisham.
So far, Bailey’s 2014 debut “The Professor” is his biggest seller, with more than 250,000 copies sold. He might have a new personal bestseller though. Published Sept.1 and available earlier for Amazon First Reads subscribers, “Rich Blood” has already racked up more than 10,000 reviews.
Megha Parekh, a Thomas & Mercer senior editor who works with Bailey, attributes Bailey’s success to his skill as a writer and the broad appeal of his books. Based in Seattle, Parekh describes “Rich Blood” as “‘Better Call Saul’ meets Greg Iles,” referring to the hit TV crime series and prolific Mississippi novelist.
To Parekh, “Jason Rich is one of those rare characters who’s both flawed and captivating. I couldn’t stop reading as I followed him through the incredible twists and turns this story took.”
In the book, Rich’s advertising slogan is “IN AN ACCIDENT? GET RICH!” To avoid sleazy caricature - and make him someone readers will spend 379 pages with - Bailey put him against the ropes. Rich is recently divorced and out of rehab. He’s on a zero-tolerance standing with the Alabama State Bar Association.
Then, Rich’s sister is accused of murdering her husband. She asks Rich to represent her. With his life in a downward spiral, the case become a lifeline for him.
One problem. It will be his first jury trial ever. “He has settled a lot of cases,” Bailey explains. “He’s a successful lawyer, but he hasn’t really gotten in the courtroom a lot, which isn’t all that uncommon for a civil litigator.”
As a writer, Bailey draws the reader in quickly. His style’s lean with just the right flecks of specific detail and the pace doesn’t induce sleep.
There’s also a strong sense of place. “Rich Blood” is set mainly in the Lake Guntersville area of Alabama, where Rich grew up but has been away for a while. Bailey describes Lake Guntersville, which is a 40-minute or so drive from Huntsville, as “a natural wonder” emanating “beauty, mystery, romance and even a twinge of danger.”
Bailey’s previous books, including the McMurtrie and Drake and “Bocephus Haynes” legal-thriller series, are also set in The Southeast. Alabama and Tennessee specifically.
If you’re familiar with Guntersville, Tuscaloosa and Pulaski, there are Easter eggs in Bailey’s books for you. You’ve eaten at the same restaurant his characters do. “It’s a way to connect beyond the page,” Bailey says.
Still, many of Bailey’s readers aren’t from The South or have even been there. His books have been published in Japan and he has readers in Australia and elsewhere abroad. He thinks the appeal to those readers is a sense of escape. “They’re getting to visit someplace they’ve never been to before.”
Alabama author Robert Bailey
Alabama author Robert Bailey is known for his legal-thrillers. (Courtesy Jimmy Bailey)
Bailey was 40 when he published his first book. It took him eight years of chipping away to finish “The Professor.” Lots of early morning writing sessions before work. That book’s storyline involved a law professor, former student, death, blackmail and even a cameo from legendary University of Alabama football coach “Bear” Bryant.
Bailey’s since streamlined his writing process. It took about four months for him to finish the first draft of “Rich Blood.” Bailey says he’s learned how to put a story “together faster in my mind, and get the story moving, while still developing the character.”
Thomas & Mercer is Amazon’s arm for thrillers, mysteries and true crime. Bailey got on their radar through literary agent Liza Fleissig, who’s known for having a good eye for thrillers.
“As an editor,” Parekh says via email, “part of what I’m looking for in a writer is not only the merits of their book, but also the potential of a long-term collaboration with Amazon Publishing. I saw endless potential in Bob. He imbues his novels with grit, emotion, perseverance and hope, and readers absolutely love them.”
Bailey, in turn, has seen writing potential in others. He encouraged longtime friend Bill Fowler, as Fowler was writing his own first novel. In 2020, Fowler, who by day works in real estate tech, published “Free and Clear,” a book inspired by his experiences as a local musician.
When the two Huntsville High grads would get together over beers, Fowler would ask Bailey for advice on everything from plot to publishing. But he learned just as much from watching Bailey’s work ethic. And not just the discipline to write every morning.
For “The Professor,” before Bailey had a publishing deal, Bailey would load up copies in his car and take them to indie booksellers to get them to carry the book. “A lot of writers just assume,” Fowler says, “you’re going to throw it out on the internet and the world is going to beat a path to your door. And it just doesn’t work that way. You’re swimming in the sea of people who are competing with you for shelf-space. Bob did tons of roadwork and built relationships.”
Legal-thriller fans are known for being loyal. Once they find an author or series they like, they lock-in for book after book. But Fowler says Bailey has more going on than just genre algorithms. “Bob comes up with great stories,” Fowler says. “He’s not trying to solve the world’s problems. He’s trying to give people a window into something compelling and meaningful.”
When authors start doing numbers, eventually Hollywood types who develop and greenlight TV and film projects take notice. While none of Bailey’s books have been adapted yet, he says, “We’ve been very close before, and I hope that eventually that’ll happen.”
Although legal-thrillers are his calling-card, Bailey’s most personal book falls outside that genre. In 2020, he published “The Golfer’s Carol,” a golf-themed fable with tones of “It’s a Wonderful Life” and “Field Of Dreams.”
Bailey played golf in high school and college. He shared a passion for the sport with his dad, who in 2016 was diagnosed with lung cancer. Around that same time, Bailey’s wife was diagnosed with lung cancer too.
His dad was given six months to live and made it to 10. A month after his dad died in 2017, Bailey’s wife had surgery to remove most of her right lung.
Before the cancer hit, Bailey and his dad planned a trip to all the home-courses of their heroes, including Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer and Bobby Jones. They only made it to one.
Bailey wrote “The Golfer’s Carol” under these intense circumstances. “The people who’ve read it,” Bailey says, “I get a lot of emails from folks who are going through things to say, ‘Hey, I just read your book, and I just want to thank you.’ And that just means a lot to me because that’s why I wrote it.”
Grisham, the juggernaut known for “A Time To Kill,” “The Firm” and “The Pelican Brief,” casts a long shadow over Southern legal-thriller authors. Bailey is no exception.
“I probably wouldn’t be a lawyer or a writer without his influence,” Bailey says, “because I love his books and the main characters in his stories.” Bailey’s later writing inspirations include Illes, S.A. Cosby and, recently, Thomas Perry. “As a writer, it’s important to read to get better, but also to read for fun,” Bailey says, “because that’s the whole reason you do it.”
INTERVIEW WITH ROBERT BAILEY AUTHOR OF THE MCMURTRIE & DRAKE LEGAL THRILLER SERIES
Robert Bailey image
MEET ROBERT BAILEY AUTHOR OF THE MCMURTRIE & DRAKE LEGAL THRILLER SERIES
The Final Reckoning image
His last challenge: live long enough to save the lives of those he loves.
Cold-blooded killer JimBone Wheeler blames Tom McMurtrie for putting him on death row. He once vowed that he’d bring “a reckoning” on Tom and everyone the southern lawyer holds dear. When Wheeler escapes from prison, he aims to fulfill his promise. Victim by victim, he’s getting closer to his ultimate target. But for Tom, who’s dying of cancer, the role of savior and protector is a struggle that is becoming more desperate by the hour.
As the body count mounts, Tom, his partner, Rick Drake, and his best friend, Bocephus Haynes, brace for a confrontation like nothing they have ever faced before. This battle will be waged not in a courthouse but on the streets and fields of north Alabama. With all those he loves at risk, Tom must save his family, his friends, and his legacy from a killer whose hunger for retribution knows no bounds.
Now, as time ticks down and fate and vengeance close in, who will survive Wheeler’s final reckoning?
AMAZON | GOODREADS
Interview Key Shows Interviewing Interviews Or Interviewer
What was your creative process when you wrote Tom McMurtrie?
ANSWER: I was daydreaming in a law school class one day about what would happen if my professor actually had to try a case. It was very much a smart aleck idea at the time, but it stuck with me. Soon, I was imagining this legendary professor who would return to the courtroom with a former student and I had the situation that would form the basis for The Professor.
What type of law did he teach in book one, The Professor?
ANSWER: Evidence
What’s the relationship like between Tom McMurtrie and Rick Drake?
ANSWER: Tom was Rick’s Evidence professor and trial team coach when Rick was in law school. During a trial team competition, Rick and Tom got into an altercation, and the publicity from this incident cost Rick a job with a prestigious law firm and forced him to hang a shingle and become a solo practitioner. In The Professor, Tom refers a longtime friend, whose family has been killed in a tragic trucking collision in Henshaw, Alabama, to Rick for representation. He makes the referral because Rick is from Henshaw but also in the hopes that the case would give Rick’s career a boost. The two men’s estranged relationship eventually resolves and they team up to take on the trucking company by the end of the story. For the remaining three books, they are partners in the law firm of McMurtrie & Drake.
Legal Sign Design With Scales Of Justice Symbol.
Who is Bocephus Haynes and how did he meet Tom?
ANSWER: Bo is also a former student of Tom’s as well as being Tom’s best friend. Bo is an African-American attorney practicing in Pulaski, Tennessee. Bo met Tom after an injury derailed his football career during college. After being mentored by Tom, Bo decided to go to law school and went on to become one of the finest trial lawyers in the state of Tennessee.
In The Last Trial, what’s the story behind Tom and his old nemesis Jack Willistone?
ANSWER: Jack Willistone was the ruthless trucking tycoon from The Professor, who is arrested at the end of the story. Jack makes a brief cameo in book two, Between Black and White, and is murdered at the beginning of The Last Trial. The person accused of the crime, Wilma Newton, is represented by Tom in the ensuing murder trial after Wilma’s oldest daughter begs Tom to take the case.
The Last Trial image
In The Final Reckoning, who is Jimbone Wheeler?
ANSWER: JimBone Wheeler is a death row inmate who blames his imprisonment on Tom. At the beginning of the story, JimBone escapes from incarceration with the help of a rogue nurse.
Death row prison image dark
What are his motivations in this story?
ANSWER: To bring a reckoning on Tom and everyone Tom holds dear.
What kind of cancer is Tom McMurtrie dealing with in The Final Reckoning?
ANSWER: State IV lung cancer
What is he fighting for in this story?
ANSWER: Tom is literally fighting for his life and the lives of those he loves, as he tries to stop JImBone Wheeler from obtaining his reckoning.
Robert Bailey image
Robert Bailey was born in Huntsville, Alabama, the son of a builder and a schoolteacher. From the time he could walk, he’s loved stories, especially those about Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant and his beloved Alabama Crimson Tide football team.
Robert obtained a Bachelor of Arts in History from Davidson College in North Carolina. Law School at the University of Alabama followed, where Robert made Law Review, competed on the school’s trial team and managed to watch every home football game.
For the past thirteen years, he’s been a civil defense trial lawyer in his hometown of Huntsville. He’s married to the incomparable Dixie Bailey and they have two boys and a little girl.
When Robert’s not writing, practicing law or being a parent, he enjoys playing golf, watching Alabama football and coaching his sons’ little league baseball teams.
JUNE 29, 2020RYAN STECK, THE REAL BOOK SPY
LEGACY OF LIES: Five Questions with Robert Bailey
If you aren’t reading Robert Bailey’s books, you’re missing out in a big way.
Best known for his McMurtrie and Drake legal thrillers, Bailey’s latest novel, Legacy of Lies (a spinoff of that series), follows Bocephus “Bo” Haynes, a small-town attorney who takes on prejudice and corruption when a friend of his, who happens to be the District Attorney, is arrested following the murder of her husband—and he agrees to defend her in court.
Twisting and turning its way towards a stunning final act, Bailey’s latest offering falls somewhere between John Grisham and Robert Dugoni, and one thing’s for sure . . . if you enjoy either of those writers, you have to check this book out.
Just after Legacy of Lies was released (it currently has over 900 reviews on Amazon with an average rating of 4.4/5 stars), Robert Bailey agreed to go on the record for our Five Questions segment, and I asked him about everything from how he came up with the story idea for this book to what his writing process is like and everything in between.
Check out the full Q&A below, then make sure to order your copy of Legacy of Lies, now available in paperback, ebook, and audiobook.
A Legacy of lies
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TRBS: First and foremost, I really enjoyed this book. It reads so fast and grabs you right out of the gate. I Was really blown away. How did you come up with the story idea for this one?
Bailey: Thank you! Legacy of Lies is a spinoff of my McMurtrie & Drake series. I wanted a compelling reason that would bring McMurtrie & Drake supporting character, Bocephus Haynes, back to his home town of Pulaski, Tennessee. Having Bo’s friend, prosecutor Helen Lewis (also a character in the prior series), charged with capital murder in her own county was the perfect vehicle.
TRBS: What sort of research did you have to do before actually sitting down to write?
Bailey: As I don’t do much criminal work and I don’t practice law in Tennessee, I had to do some research regarding the typical layout of a criminal trial in Tennessee as well as the sentencing guidelines for certain crimes that are mentioned in the story. Also, the book is set in the real-life town of Pulaski, Tennessee, and I visited Pulaski several times to make sure I had the correct names of streets, restaurants, etc.
TRBS: What is your writing process like? Do you outline, make it up as you go? Do you have a target word count you try to hit each day?
Bailey: I start with a fairly loose synopsis—a clear beginning, a general way I want the story to end, and a few subplots I want to explore in the middle. Then I just blow and go until I reach “The End.” I try to write the first draft of the story as fast as possible, knowing that I can always go back and tweak and fix things once I have a completed story. My target word count is 1,000 words a day when I’m writing a first draft. As I get closer to the end (and closer to my deadline-ha!), that count will typically rise.
TRBS: Who are some of your favorite authors, and what books are currently on your TBR list?
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Bailey: I love Michael Connelly, C.J. Box, Stephen King, John Sandford, Greg Iles, John Grisham, Scott Turow, Harlan Coben, and Lee Child just to name a few. I’m anxious to read Connelly’s Fair Warning and Turow’s The Last Trial, both of which came out at the same time as Legacy of Lies.
TRBS: Lastly, what’s next from you?
Bailey: In October of this year, my first foray into inspirational fiction, The Golfer’s Carol, will be released from Putnam. The story features a man contemplating suicide, who is given a wonderful gift: four rounds of golf with his four heroes. The book mixes elements from It’s a Wonderful Life, A Christmas Carol, and Field of Dreams. My next legal thriller, The Wrong Side (Bocephus Haynes #2) comes out in May 2021 from Thomas & Mercer, and I’m working on the manuscript as we speak.
Between Black and White
Robert Bailey
Thomas & Mercer
c/o Amazon Digital Publishing
9781503953079, $15.95, PB, 398pp, www.amazon.com
Synopsis: In 1966 in Pulaski, Tennessee, Bocephus Haynes watched in horror as his father was brutally murdered by ten local members of the Ku Klux Klan. As an African American lawyer practicing in the birthplace of the Klan years later, Bo has spent his life pursuing justice in his father's name. But when Andy Walton, the man believed to have led the lynch mob forty-five years earlier, ends up murdered in the same spot as Bo's father, Bo becomes the prime suspect. Retired law professor Tom McMurtrie, Bo's former teacher and friend, is a year removed from returning to the courtroom. Now McMurtrie and his headstrong partner, Rick Drake, must defend Bo on charges of capital murder while hunting for Andy Walton's true killer. In a courtroom clash that will put their reputations and lives at stake, can McMurtrie and Drake release Bo from a lifetime of despair? Or will justice remain hidden somewhere between black and white?
Critique: A gripping legal suspense thriller of the first order, "Between Black and White" clearly displays author Robert Bailey's impressive talents as a novelist. An absorbing and riveting read from beginning to end, "Between Black and White" is certain to be an enduringly popular addition to community library collections. For personal reading lists it should be noted that "Between Black and White" is also available in a Kindle edition ($5.99).
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Midwest Book Review
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"Between Black and White." Small Press Bookwatch, Mar. 2016. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A449545316/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=4ce43e45. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.
Robert Bailey. Thomas & Mercer, $15.95 trade paper (360p) ISBN 978-1-5420-0426-8
Attorney Bo Haynes, a supporting character from Bailey's McMurtrie and Drake series (The Final Reckoning, etc.), takes center stage in this uninspired legal thriller. Bo gets the defense client of a lifetime in the person of Helen Lewis, the district attorney general for four Tennessee counties. A former beauty pageant contestant with a reputation for meanness, Helen has been charged with the shooting murder of her ex-husband, lawyer Butch Renfroe. Helen was seen entering Butch's house shortly before the crime, and she previously threatened to kill him after he suggested he might reveal a decades-old secret that could end her career. Bo's byzantine backstory--he's an African-American whose biological father was the Imperial Wizard of the KKK--doesn't make suspending disbelief any easier as his defense of Helen takes some unlikely turns. Purple prose (Bo "knew pain. He rode in the cockpit with it. He bathed in it every morning and night") distracts. Readers interested in courtroom dramas set against a backdrop of Southern corruption won't find this an acceptable John Grisham substitute. Agent: Liza Fleissig, Liza Royce Agency. (Apr.)
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"Legacy of Lies." Publishers Weekly, vol. 267, no. 7, 17 Feb. 2020, pp. 178+. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A615711386/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=c17c680e. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.
The Golfer's Carol
Robert Bailey. Putnam, $24 (240p) ISBN 978-0-593-19050-0
A dejected man gains a new perspective on his life's challenges in this sentimental golfing parable from Bailey (the McMurtie and Drake Legal Thrillers series). On his 40th birthday in 1986, Alabama insurance lawyer Randy Clark intends to kill himself. Still grieving his young son's leukemia death three years earlier and embitteted about giving up his professional golf dreams, he hopes his life insurance will wipe out his debt, provide for his wife, and let his daughter attend college. After the ghost of his best friend, pro golfer Darby Hays, appears with the news that he'd just died while driving drunk, Randy postpones the plan. Later, Darby's ghost informs Randy he will have a chance to play four rounds of golf with his greatest heroes. Over the next several days, Randy is mystically transported to a series of famous courses. He plays golf with Bobby Jones, who teaches him about self-control; Ben Hogan, who encourages resilience; and Arnold Palmer, who pushes him to overcome his self-doubt. As Randy prepares for the final round promised by Darby, the hero who appears is not who he expects. While the lessons are a bit shallow, Bailey wrings genuine emotion from Randy's tragedies. This life-affirming sports odyssey will appeal to fans of uncomplicated inspirational yarns. Agent: Liza Fleissig, Liza Royce Agency. (Oct.)
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"The Golfer's Carol." Publishers Weekly, vol. 267, no. 35, 31 Aug. 2020, p. 33. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A635645477/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=9d2c0684. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.
Bailey, Robert THE WRONG SIDE Thomas & Mercer (Fiction None) $15.95 8, 3 ISBN: 978-1-5420-2593-5
African American lawyer Bocephus Haynes accepts a second case guaranteed to set him against pretty much everybody of all races in Giles County, Tennessee.
Minutes after her last tender moments with star high school running back Odell Champagne, Brittany Crutcher, the lead singer for the rising teen band Fizz, leaves a note in his locker telling him she’s leaving the next morning for LA after signing a solo contract that will leave Fizz out in the cold along with Odell. When he sees the note, Odell, having just dominated the intervening football game and heard Fizz crush the halftime show, is enraged, so when a sanitation worker finds Brittany dead in the back of a school bus the next morning, her head smashed in by a beer bottle, it's no surprise that Odell’s prints are all over it or that Chief Deputy Sheriff Frannie Storm arrests Odell for murder. Facing certain conviction, Odell begs Bo Haynes, whom he’s idolized ever since Bo’s own football days at Giles County High, to defend him. Bo takes his sweet time before committing himself, realizing that although both the victim and the defendant are Black, there are difficult racial currents at work. Also, taking the case will antagonize everyone from District Attorney General Helen Lewis to Israel Crutcher, Brittany’s father, who vows violent revenge against anyone who sides with Odell. And there turns out to be good reason for his hesitation, for his own search for an alternative suspect in Michael Zannick, the White manager who landed Brittany’s contract in return for the usual personal accommodations, is torpedoed when Zannick produces an alibi from a wholly unexpected source.
Social tensions redoubled by race intensify a workmanlike mystery.
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"Bailey, Robert: THE WRONG SIDE." Kirkus Reviews, 1 June 2021, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A667031396/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=1d73a9e1. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.
* The Wrong Side
Robert Bailey. Thomas & Mercer, $15.95 trade paper (400p) ISBN 978-1-5420-2593-5
The murder of Brittany Crutcher, a senior at Tennessee's Giles County High School, drives Bailey's exceptional sequel to 2020's Legacy of Lies. Charged with the crime is football star Odell Champagne, who was found passed out next to Brittany's body in the back of a school bus, clutching the victim's bloody sweatshirt and with the murder weapon, a broken beer bottle, nearby. The night before the murder, Brittany broke up with Odell, who has priors for theft and juvenile assault. Odell, the son of an alcoholic mother and an absent father, turns for help to lawyer Bocephus "Bo" Haynes, who has consistently watched out for him over the years.
Believing in Odell's innocence, Bo agrees to defend Odell, despite knowing that taking the nearly hopeless case could harm his business and make him a pariah in a town whose inhabitants are convinced of Odell's guilt. Bailey expertly ratchets up the suspense as the plot builds to a surprise punch ending. Readers will impatiently await the next in the series. Agent: Liza Fleissig, Liza Royce Agency. (Aug.)
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"The Wrong Side." Publishers Weekly, vol. 268, no. 25, 21 June 2021, pp. 112+. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A667264900/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=3446af73. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.
Bailey, Robert RICH BLOOD Thomas & Mercer (Fiction None) $11.99 9, 1 ISBN: 978-1-5420-3727-3
An Alabama personal injury lawyer who seems to have modeled his professional and personal life on Better Call Saul is called on for his first criminal case.
Nobody disputes a few simple facts: That handyman Waylon Pike was carrying on an affair with his frequent employer Jana Waters; that he killed her husband, Dr. Braxton Waters; and that he confessed as much first to a casual acquaintance and then to the police. What's under debate is whether the $15,000 Pike received for the murder came, as he told the cops, from Jana Waters, who just happened to withdraw that exact sum from her bank the day before, or from someone else. For most residents of Guntersville, this debate is purely theoretical since they're sure that Jana hired her adulterous husband's killer. Even Jana's brother, billboard-loving attorney Jason Rich, finds it hard to believe that his long-estranged sister isn't guilty. But he's moved to defend her by the tearful pleas of her daughters, Niecy and Nola, whom he hasn't seen for years, and by a more pressing threat by local drug king Tyson Cade, who'd taken advantage of Jana repeatedly to defer her payment of the $50,000 she owed him for his product. Cade doesn't want Jana to testify in her own defense, and he really doesn't want his own name to come up in the trial. So he demands that Jason not take the case, letting it go to a less-motivated appointed attorney, or if he does take the case, that he keep Jana off the stand. The obstacles would be formidable even for an experienced criminal defense attorney; a novice like Jason can only pray for a miracle. Bailey conscientiously sweats the details all the way to a dazzling but not entirely persuasive double-twist ending.
Workmanlike and consistently absorbing but not spectacular except for that eye-rolling epilogue.
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"Bailey, Robert: RICH BLOOD." Kirkus Reviews, 15 June 2022, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A706932994/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=8e39e988. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.
Bailey, Robert RICH WATERS Thomas & Mercer (Fiction None) $16.99 6, 20 ISBN: 9781542037297
An alcoholic attorney's second murder case looks every bit as impossible as his first.
The morning after former high school football star Trey Cowan, reduced to sanitation work by a broken leg and a botched surgery, threatens to kill Sgt. Kelly Flowers, meth lord Tyson Cade's inside man on Alabama's Marshall County police force, Flowers is found shotgunned to death at a deserted farm. When Trey is arrested, Cade--who warned personal injury lawyer Jason Rich not to defend his own sister when she was accused of murder in Rich Blood (2022)--demands that Jason take the case pro bono. Trey refuses to tell Jason anything that might help in his defense, and the evidence against him is so damning that Jason is reduced to begging Cade for help. Cade, determined to play the piper who calls the tune, produces an alternative suspect, but it's the last person in the world Jason wants to incriminate. In the meantime, Cade has anointed a new inside source in the police department, and Det. Hatty Daniels, the supervisor who'd opened an investigation of Flowers before his death, is convinced that it must be her boss, Sheriff Richard Griffith, or her old partner, Sgt. George Mitchell, since only they could have wiped her files on Flowers from her hard drive. With such a short list of suspects, Jason's job should be easy, but the pressures on him from his ex-lover, his impossible niece, his nonpaying boss, and the legal system that's pressing charges against him are so intense that he realizes that "I could win this case and still lose everything I care about."
Not much of a mystery but a compelling dive into the life of a lawyer out way past his depth.
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"Bailey, Robert: RICH WATERS." Kirkus Reviews, 1 May 2023, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A747342331/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=2a588ceb. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.
Bailey, Robert RICH JUSTICE Thomas & Mercer (Fiction None) $16.99 5, 7 ISBN: 9781662516634
Now that he's won two high-profile murder cases, Alabama "billboard lawyer" Jason Rich takes on his most challenging client: himself.
When methamphetamine lord Tyson Cade is gunned down outside a grocery store moments after clerk Marcia "Dooby" Darnell spurned his latest advance, you'd think the woods would be full of suspects, from Matty Dean, the distributor who immediately seizes violent control of the Sand Mountain meth operation in Cade's absence, to the hard-used Dooby herself. But newly appointed Marshall County Sheriff Hatty Daniels and newly reelected D.A. Aloysius Holloway "Wish" French ignore all the others to concentrate on Jason, whose two earlier brushes with Cade brought him nothing but grief, who was seen nearby and caught on camera a few minutes later, and whom Cade identified as his killer with his dying breath. Insisting against all advice on defending himself, Jason accepts an inspired suggestion as his advisory counsel: Shay Lankford, the career prosecutor Wish French defeated in the last election. After rooting around endlessly in local secrets and scandals that take a heavy toll on Jason's allies, profiler Albert Hooper comes up with enough evidence to guarantee a mistrial. But Jason doesn't want a new trial; he wants to win the trial he's in, and eventually he does, though not without spending a good deal of time relitigating the painful legacies of his first two murder cases. And although this case seems designed to avoid the very possibility of a surprise ending, Bailey closes by pulling a rabbit as big as a kangaroo from his hat.
Sturdy legal thrills for readers willing to go the distance with a flawed hero in an even more flawed world.
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"Bailey, Robert: RICH JUSTICE." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Mar. 2024, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A786185857/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=8f43e8f2. Accessed 5 Apr. 2024.
You are here: Home / Book Reviews / “The Professor,” by Robert Bailey
“THE PROFESSOR,” BY ROBERT BAILEY
JANUARY 13, 2016 BY CLAIRE MATTURRO 3 COMMENTS
Robert Bailey
Robert Bailey
Reviewed by Claire Hamner Matturro
Move over, John Grisham, there’s a new kid on the legal thriller playing field.
Robert Bailey, an Alabama trial attorney and graduate of The University of Alabama School of Law, returns the kickoff for a 100 yard touchdown with his debut novel, The Professor. The football reference is apropos as the protagonist of The Professor was a member of Alabama’s famous 1961 National Champion football team, and the book opens with a guest appearance by venerated Alabama football coach, Paul “Bear” Bryant. Alabama’s 1961 national championship was the first of the six that Bear Bryant would win as head coach of the Crimson Tide, and the fighting spirit of that 1961 team resounds throughout the novel.
But one does not need to be a football fan or even a fan of legal thrillers to enjoy Bailey’s book as its writing is smooth, captivating and, in all the right places, emotionally moving—all the more impressive in that Bailey only took a single creative writing class while an undergraduate at Davidson College. According to Bailey, “We wrote four short stories, and the critiques I received were mostly positive. It was definitely a confidence builder and a whole lot of fun.”
How did he go from taking just one creative writing class to writing a riveting debut of a legal thriller?
In law school, Bailey served on the law review, an honor generally reserved for those who can write well. Yet there is a football field of difference in writing an analytical, academic, footnoted and blue-booked law review article and composing an edge-of-your-seat legal thriller.
The bridge, then, between writing like a lawyer and writing like a top-drawer novelist was part inspiration, part studying other novels, and part the hard work of rewriting, redrafting, and revising. Bailey’s inspiration came from growing up in Alabama as a Bear Bryant fan and from wanting to write about a brash young “bull-in-a-china-shop” new attorney—a character whose experiences resemble Bailey’s own days straight out of law school. As for studying other legal thrillers and books, Bailey has said, “Yes, I have learned a lot from reading other novels. Also, Stephen King’s instructional memoir, On Writing, was a big influence and inspiration.” And as for the hard work of revision and rewriting—it took Bailey eight years to finish The Professor, though he was practicing law, trying cases, and raising a family at the same time.
Bailey, a history major and a Huntsville, Alabama, native, is quite the Bear Bryant fan and a football historian. These personal interests enrich The Professor and play into Bailey’s creation of the lead character, Professor Thomas Jackson McMurtrie.
In some ways McMurtrie, the protagonist, is an unusual leading man. For one thing, he is 68 and his glory days on the famous Alabama football team of 1961 are long behind him. He faces serious health issues, mourns his late wife, and has been unfairly manipulated out of his position as an evidence professor at the University of Alabama School of Law into an unwanted early retirement. One of his former students—and a man he had called a friend—was complicit in the scheme to push him out as a law professor, and the betrayal wounds McMurtrie deeply.
Yet, in other ways, McMurtrie is the ideal leading man—for one thing his skills and instincts as a trial attorney form the perfect balance to his headstrong, volatile former student, Rick Drake, when they take on a trucking company in a wrongful-death case. McMurtrie, named after Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, epitomizes what we would want in both a leading man and a lawyer—he is somewhat of a modern Atticus Finch, albeit with some different demons. Bailey writes in his author’s notes that he wanted to create a character that was a “man of exceptional integrity, strength, and class.” This Bailey has done.
Rick Drake, the lawyer version of a yin to McMurtrie’s yang, is more of what readers might expect in legal thrillers. A young lawyer, brash, over his head, yet passionate about his client and the case, Drake has more gumption and zeal than skills. He needs the experience and even temperament of McMurtrie. Drake also needs an expert in evidence, and McMurtrie literally wrote the textbook on evidence law in Alabama.
But here’s the rub: Drake and McMurtrie have a turbulent history. Drake was McMurtrie’s law student and the two came to blows—literally—after Drake hotheadedly dashed his trial advocate team’s chances of winning a national trial competition. McMurtrie was the team’s coach. After a video of the angry clash between the professor and the student was posted on YouTube, a conniving new dean at the law school used the incident as part of his plan to push McMurtrie out of his tenured position.
So, let’s just say Drake and McMurtrie are not best friends.
Yet each man knows the value of the other. Drake has the vigor McMurtrie fears is waning in himself. And McMurtrie has decades of knowledge and the calm, deliberate skills Drake lacks.
Thus, out of these conflicts and contrasting personalities, the characters of McMurtrie and Drake form an integral part of what makes The Professor work so well. This is a book about people, vividly drawn and fully realized, overcoming obstacles within themselves—as well as obstacles placed in their way by unscrupulous others.
Superb writing and engaging protagonists, though, are not the only things that make this debut so compelling. This is a bam-bam-bam book as far as plot goes, with plenty of action in and out of the courtroom. In the opening chapters, there is a horrific and fiery automobile crash, betrayal, suicide, murder, blackmail and enough suspense to keep the reader turning pages all night. There’s a good reason Winston Groom, author of Forrest Gump and another Alabama writer, calls The Professor “[g]ripping from the first page to the last.”
In a tightly woven plot that unfolds naturally in well-paced scenes, McMurtrie refers a former girlfriend (from the days before his marriage) to Drake for representation in a wrongful-death action after her granddaughter, daughter and son-in-law slam into a speeding eighteen-wheeler and die. McMurtrie recommends that she retain Drake in part because Drake grew up in the town where the lawsuit will be tried and McMurtrie believes in the home-court advantage. Yet McMurtrie also believes Drake can win the case—and he wants to help the struggling lawyer.
The defendant trucking company’s owner is an unscrupulous yet tough adversary who has the power to pervert the quest for hard evidence. Drake and McMurtrie have to prove in a court of law what they know is true—the trucking company had a consistent, deliberate pattern of forcing its truckers to speed in order to clock more miles and make more money for the company. Yet the trucking company’s owner doesn’t play by any rules, which gives him an apparent upper hand in disposing of key witnesses and the paper trail of evidence. Compounding the pressure on Drake and McMurtrie, the trucking company’s attorney is none other than McMurtrie’s former friend who betrayed him and helped oust him from his teaching career.
The stakes go beyond money. The plaintiff wants the world to know the truth about the accident—that her family died because of a concerted, greedy corporate plan that turned its eighteen-wheelers into dangerous weapons.
McMurtrie wants to avenge himself against his former friend and later betrayer, and he wants to help his former girlfriend. Not incidentally, he hopes to prove that even at 68, “The old bull still has a little gas in the tank.” And, maybe, he hopes to get his job as a law professor back. He definitely wants to help Drake and set matters right between them.
Yet in some ways, Drake is the one who has the most at stake. The YouTube of his shoving contest with McMurtrie painted him as an uncontrollable hothead and cost him his position at a big law firm. He is barely earning his rent as a solo practitioner. He questions himself. If Drake is going to survive as an attorney, he needs a courtroom victory. But beyond building his career, he needs to get right in his own head and prove he is capable of being a winning trial attorney—one who will not blow up and ruin the case as he did during the law school trial team competition. Drake is a young man, not fully formed as a man or an attorney, and this trial will make or break his maturation.
The trial scenes resonate with realism. Naturally so, given that the author is a practicing attorney and a shareholder with the law firm of Lanier Ford in Huntsville. Interestingly enough, the author defends—among others—trucking companies. Similar to his character Drake, Bailey was a winner in trial advocacy competitions while in law school.
The Professor introduces the character of Bocephus Haynes, McMurtrie’s favorite former student. Bocephus plays an important yet secondary role in the story as ally and emotional support, but he is set to return in a leading role in the sequel, Between Black and White. A third manuscript, now in the works, will take Drake and McMurtrie back to Tuscaloosa, and Drake’s story line and growth as a character will be explored further and in more detail.
You are here: Home / Book Reviews / “Between Black and White,” by Robert Bailey
“BETWEEN BLACK AND WHITE,” BY ROBERT BAILEY
APRIL 18, 2016 BY CLAIRE MATTURRO 1 COMMENT
Robert Bailey
Robert Bailey
Reviewed by Claire Hamner Matturro
Following the success of his powerful debut legal thriller, The Professor (Thomas & Mercer 2015), Bailey offers a second, stunning story in the series. In his novel Between Black and White (Thomas & Mercer March 2016), Bailey establishes beyond doubt that he is an author to be read and reckoned with.
Between Black and White is closely tied to Bailey’s first book and involves several of the same characters. In The Professor, readers were introduced to aging former law professor Tom McMurtrie, who returns to the courtroom after being forced out of his teaching position at The University of Alabama School of Law. Tom teams up with Rick Drake, an impetuous young attorney and his one-time student. Together, in The Professor, Tom and Rick pursue a tense and dangerous wrongful death lawsuit.
While Tom and Rick dominate The Professor, another lawyer—Bocephus Haynes, or Bo—steps into that story at critical times to boost and support Tom. Bo is a bigger than life black University of Alabama football star who blew out his knee and, instead of retreating into depression over the loss of a pro football career, goes to law school. Tom is one of his professors, and the two develop a close friendship.
As much as The Professor was Tom and Rick’s story, Between Black and White is Bo’s story. In the prologue, we meet Bo as a five-year-old who watches members of the Ku Klux Klan lynch his beloved father. From the opening pages of Chapter One—which finds a disheartened, angry Bo getting drunk on the anniversary of his father’s brutal lynching—to the shocking, violent conclusion, Bo leaps off the pages with boldness and spirit. But like all well-crafted fictional heroes, he is flawed, and his failings land him in a courtroom as the sole defendant in a capital murder case.
His near fatal flaw: hunger for revenge. Obsessed with punishing the man who lynched his father, Bo shapes his professional life around that goal. After graduating with honors from The University of Alabama School of Law, Bo turns down offers at prestigious law firms. He returns to his home town, Pulaski, Tennessee, to a solo law practice as the city’s only black attorney—and to pursue the man he holds responsible for his father’s death. Too many people in the city of Pulaski know Bo is driven by his fixation to punish the man he blames for his father’s lynching. His wife has even left him because his drive to avenge his father’s murder has endangered their two children.
Since Bo was five years-old, he has blamed Andrew Davis Walton, a powerful businessman in Pulaski, for his father’s death. Once the Imperial Wizard of the Tennessee Knights of the KKK, Walton shook off the robes of the Klan and made millions in the stock market. Known as the “the Warren Buffett of the South,” he tried to make amends for his Klan actions.
Yet people have a long memory when it comes to the Klan—and no one more than Bo. Though Walton was hooded the night five-year-old Bo witnessed the lynching, Bo recognized Walton’s voice. But no one in law enforcement was ever willing—then or later—to prosecute Walton on the testimony of a child claiming to identify a voice.
On the 45th anniversary of his father’s lynching, Bo gets drunks in a local bar. Walton and Maggie, Walton’s aging, beautiful wife and one of the local landed aristocracy, seemingly accidentally run into Bo in the bar. Face to face with Walton, Bo threatens him in front of witnesses by quoting the Old Testament’s “eye for an eye.”
After the bartender breaks up the confrontation, Walton steps outside. But before Bo leaves the bar, Maggie returns to tell him that Walton is dying. She asks that Bo leave her terminally ill husband alone. Bo staggers out, lamenting to himself that Andy Walton was going to die before he could bring him to justice.
That night, someone shoots Walton and stages a mock lynching at the site where Bo’s father was lynched four and a half decades before.
Physical evidence points directly at Bo. Everyone in the legal community knows he had the motive and opportunity. Even before Bo recovers from his hangover, he is in jail. The prosecutor, a fierce woman attorney who has butted heads with Bo in court before, decides to seek the death penalty.
Pulaski was the birthplace of the Ku Klux Klan, and many residents and officials in the city strive to live that down. So when the murder, with its roots in the old KKK lynching, puts Pulaski and its Klan heritage back in the spotlight of national media, city officials attempt to pressure Bo to plead guilty and avoid the further media circus of a trial.
Bo refuses. He is innocent of murdering Walton—or so he claims, though no one in law enforcement believes him. He calls on his former law professor and close friend, Tom, to defend him. Reluctantly, Tom agrees and retains local attorney Raymond “Ray Ray” Pickalew, another former U of A football player. Rick, who is now Tom’s law partner, is dragged into the case as well.
Though Tom and Rick sense a setup, they struggle against multiple roadblocks—and the overwhelming physical evidence of Bo’s guilt—to determine who had a motive to kill Andy Walton and frame Bo. During their quest, Tom is assaulted and sidelined by his injuries; Ray Ray is a drunk with an attitude, and young. Overwhelmed Rick is left to unravel the seemingly unrelated pieces of a complex, emotional puzzle. Villains from The Professor return to taunt and threaten Tom and Rick, adding further intricacy to the plot.
Thus, Bailey sets up the classic formula of a legal thriller. Mind you, formula is not used as a derogatory term here. Shakespeare’s sonnets were formula and critics do not dismiss them in disparaging terms. As used here, formula simply refers to the structure and elements that define a genre or a literary style. In a legal thriller where the focus is on a criminal defendant on trial for his or her life, readers expect the odds to be stacked against the defendant. They expect the defense attorneys to be complicated, troubled, overwhelmed and conflicted. And, owing perhaps to the Perry Mason standard, readers expect a surprise witness and revelation near the close of the trial which allows the defense attorneys to prevail and the defendant to be found not guilty.
There are, of course, notable exceptions to this basic formula. Lincoln Lawyer and A Time to Kill come to mind. Both of those legal thrillers had guilty defendants, yet with vastly differing twists at the end.
Given the formulaic elements at play in the genre, a successful legal thriller author has to avoid creating a stale, mechanical plot that reads like a written version of a paint-by-number canvas. Yet the author has to keep the plot within the confines of the genre or publishers will scratch their heads and throw the manuscript on the reject pile.
In other words, authors working within a prescribed genre face a kind of delicate yet vicious circle. On the one hand, they must write within the parameters of their chosen genre. But, on the other hand, they have to do something new, exciting and fresh. It’s kind of like saying: Color within the lines. But don’t color within the lines.
Within this catch-22, the author has to give the reader something more—and something different. This Bailey does, and does with a bang.
Yet, having said that much, to say much more about the surprising, original twists of Between Black and White risks spoiling the plot. Thus, this reviewer will only observe that per the Perry Mason/John Grisham model, an unexpected witness with a startling revelation does pop up at the end of the trial. But just when the reader settles back to relax and believe that justice has been achieved, something complicated, violent and utterly surprising happens.
It isn’t just that Bailey knows how to surprise us, but he also writes well. Very well. Make no mistake on that point. His sentences are clear, clean, distinctive, and when they need to hit with a punch, they do. His pacing is excellent—an edge-of-the-seat, can’t-put-it-down momentum fuels the storyline from the prologue to the climatic ending. His characters are well-drawn, his sense of place and world-building excellent. The plot is intricate, but believable. There is redemption for some characters, resolution for others—and those that deserve neither are left to flounder in their own hell. Justice is achieved, albeit in a confused, violent way.
In short, Bailey wrestles what in less talented hands could have been a formulaic story into something wholly fresh, engaging, and ultimately rich and satisfying. This is a book you want to own and read.