THE GUILTY PLEA by Robert Rotenberg ***

I would say this was one of the better murder mysteries I've read but I can't because the evidence throughout the entire novel was completely missing. There was a bloody knife preserved with hand and fingerprints (never mentioned) and all other hair and fibers existed but that's it. MENTIONED. No explanation about what they showed. No info on who's blood, who's fingerprint, who who who. No 'this hair belonged to so and so'. How can you write a murder mystery, have a woman put on trial with NO EVIDENCE given any weight thru the novel at all. STUPID. Thru the entire novel I kept waiting for evidence. Nada. Page 229 mentions there IS evidence. But nothing else about it. A huge part of the defense was about what order the knife wounds were. WHY? No particular reason. It made no sense to me at all why this was so important and the KNIFE/BLOOD/PRINT EVIDENCE was ignored!!! WTF?

Then the woman charged with the crime says to her attorney "Let's say 'theoretically', I told you Terry was cutting up some fruit for Simon's breakfast when I came in." Then the stupid ass of a lawyer made up some more of the story instead of asking her to continue, or asking 'is that true' or whatever. Not only that but at the end of the novel HOW DID SHE KNOW that being so innocent and all?? Later you get a confession but geez too late for me to care because I'm so pissed off the evidence is invisible. She also was described in the beginning as a cold bitch who didn't even like her own child but then she answers her lawyer in a shy demure fashion 'guilty' and whispers answers to him pathetically. This goes back and forth a lot: one second bitch, next second demure studious nerd, then sexual predator, then quietly innocent. Not consistent.

Not crazy about the book. If those things were addressed I would say the book was very good. Nice character development/relationships everywhere else, nice climax build up, ok on descriptions and stuff like that. Well enough written that I wanted to continue but without the evidence during the trial I was fed up with the whole thing. So puzzling why the elephant in the room remained invisible for 300 pages.
BIG BIG Elephant. Invisible.