I picked this up with a few doubts, having read a mixed bag of collaborative works from James Patterson recently. It didn't take long, however, for these doubts to be quelled.
Judge and Jury tells the tale of the trial of mob boss Dominic Cavello. When the trial is cut short for the most brutal of reasons, FBI agent Nick Pellisante teams up with Andie DeGrasse, one of the jurors, in a personal quest to bring him to justice. Curiously, the Amazon synopsis of this book has slightly different character names, but this is a minor detail.
While like most thrillers, Judge and Jury has to be taken with a pinch of salt, the story is riveting and exciting. Ignore the slightly far-fetched and shocking mob characters, and focus instead on the slick plotting. You'll race through this book in no time. The book uses Patterson's trademark short chapters, boiling down scenes to the nitty-gritty, and it works extremely well here.
How much Andrew Gross wrote is unclear, because unlike Patterson's collaborations with Peter de Jonge, the style is very much Patterson's own. And while I still believe that Patterson is spreading himself too thin when he should be writing on his own, Judge and Jury is one of the better works in which he shares the credit with another writer. Definitely a good summer crime story, and should keep fans of Alex Cross sated until the new thriller featuring Patterson's greatest character arrives later this year.