Bob Moyer reviews the latest book in the Lincoln Lawyer series and finds that some things are different this time around.

Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer

THE PROVING GROUND. By Michael Connelly. Little, Brown. 384 pages, $32.

What’s wrong with this picture?

It certainly isn’t the writing. Michael Connelly has once again fashioned a spot-on courtroom drama, featuring Lincoln Lawyer Mickey Haller’s ingenious strategies, devious but overwhelmed opposition lawyers, a judge who keeps a tight rein on the shifty Haller, discredited witnesses, emotional testimonies and surprise reveals. The Lincoln Lawyer is at his best.

There’s something amiss, however — Haller isn’t the quite the Lincoln Lawyer readers have come to know and love.

He has moved out of his fancy offices, sold all his Lincolns (except one), and drives a sedan. He pulls the Lincoln out only when he’s already into the case. Most shocking of all is the reversal in the courtroom. Haller isn’t the defense lawyer — he’s the plaintiff’s attorney. The plaintiff here is a woman whose daughter was killed by a boy at the urging of a chatbot — or so Haller must prove. He has taken on an artificial intelligence giant, suing them not just for money, but for an admission of responsibility and an apology as well. The dynamic is familiar here — a lawyer and client facing a large, rich corporation.

In exposing the process that led to the girl’s death, Connelly spends as much time explaining the lack of ethics, guardrails and morality as he does establishing the courtroom environment. The implications are greater than just the death of one person, no matter how tragic that may be. Connelly illustrates in detail just how dangerous unlimited AI is to society. Haller, of course, takes the Goliath of a corporation down, and does it with the elan he has always shown.

Nevertheless, there’s a longing for Mickey to have conducted the case like he has done before — from the backseat of a Lincoln.