Legacy [Mass Market Paperback]

In this novel, Antonelli leaves Portland, Oregon, and travels to San Francisco to defend Jamaal Washington. Washington is a young black man accused of gunning down United States Senator Jeremy Fullerton during a robbery. Fullerton was a ruthless and ambitious politician who had many enemies. Antonelli is certain that Fullerton's death was no robbery; he is convinced that a political enemy assassinated the Senator. Antonelli is determined to free the likeable Jamaal, a soft-spoken pre-med student who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Buffa writes this book as if he were doing a painting-by-numbers. He uses plot devices that we have seen too many times before. Many authors have written more compellingly about political charlatans who pretend to be altruistic, but who are really self-serving and corrupt.

Antonelli's character is strangely lifeless, as is his love interest, Marissa. Neither the courtroom scenes nor the twist at the end can save "The Legacy" from being a run-of-the-mill legal thriller that is not up to Buffa's usually high standards.

The Legacy follows yet again farther "adventures" of Joseph Antonelli. Buffa's writing here is again pensive, reflective and attempts to be thorough when it comes to the development of his characters. But unlike in his first two books, all that seems to come at a price here. Buffa looses sight of his goal - the reader is swallowed in completely irrelevant details as the writer hopelessly tries to fill the page. Buffa becomes so lost in this book in his attempt to write an abbreviated behind the scene history of San Francisco and introduce us to the corrupt world of politicians and the rich that he forgets that he is writing a legal thriller. The book consists effectively of two parts: the first 300 pages which set up the trial and stretch a very thin story and the last 120 pages during which the trial takes place. Unfortunately, only the last 120 are worth reading and allow the book to fit the legal thriller category. In the first 300, each piece of information is repeated at least three times. This background is neither very interesting nor ultimately relevant. All I could ask myself was, what was it that interested Buffa about the rich and famous and why does he make me read it?

None of the rich and politicians are interesting characters. He even decries their corruption and their shallow intelligence - perhaps that is his purpose in this book (something the Bogdonovitch character debates in the end) - but at the same time, we are forced to read the life story of at least 3 politicians and 3 rich people. But the biggest problem for me was how Buffa portrayed the accused. I might be wrong, but I remember only about 3 instances in which Buffa even talks about him. We never get a sense of Jamaal's frustrations, inner struggles, or attempts to deal with the possibility of being convicted - even in the end! He is the least developed character in the whole book! Normally, character-development would be the last thing one would expect from legal-thrillers, but that has always been Buffa's strengths (considering the court-room action takes second stage).

Verdict: If you are looking for a smart legal-thriller with philosophical musings, with imaginative plot-twists and characters who attempt to reconcile themselves with life and everything (yes, Buffa can do all that) and offer interesting bits of wisdoms while they entertain you, I recommend the Defense and the Prosecution. The Legacy and his third novel Judgment are only for die-hart Buffa fans.