With all the new coverage of the O.J. Simpson trial last year, certain names just seemed to linger in the air. So it's probably not a big surprise that I decided to give Marcia Clark's fiction a try. And that was a mistake. I definitely should not have waited so long. 

Blood Defense is the first novel in the Samantha Brinkman series. And it's fascinating. Although the murder is fictional, the story of a tough L.A. attorney who will do whatever it takes to win in the courtroom, who is smart and strong and independent, who knows how to work the media--it all rings true with the real-life experience of someone who has been there. 

In this first novel, Samantha is hired to represent a cop accused of murdering his girlfriend, a young actress who is a popular TV star, and her roommate. She decides to take the case for the publicity (and the money, as her car is on its last legs), but the situation she soon finds herself in shakes her to her core. 

As she struggles to find alternative suspects and to manage the damaging press leaks, she also has to confront those who believe in her client's guilt as well as the ghosts of her own past. Gripping, fast-paced, and incredibly readable, Blood Defense is a perfect novel to escape from reality for a little while and get lost in an engrossing murder mystery. 

This is not Marcia Clark's first foray into fiction. She has another series, the Rachel Knight series (the first novel is Guilt by Association) which tells the other side of the courtroom story, that of the D.A. Now I'm definitely going to have to read those too! Clark is an excellent writer, and I can't wait to devour all her novels.