Pleasantville

by Attica Locke

Overview

LONGLISTED FOR THE BAILEY’S WOMEN’S PRIZE FOR FICTION

From Attica Locke, a writer and producer of FOX’s Empire, this sophisticated thriller sees lawyer Jay Porter—hero of her bestseller Black Water Rising—return to fight one last case, only to become embroiled in a dangerous game of shadowy politics and a witness to how far those in power are willing to go to win.

Fifteen years after his career-defining case against Cole Oil, Jay Porter is broke and tired. That victory might have won the environmental lawyer fame, but thanks to a string of appeals, he hasn't seen a dime. His latest case—representing Pleasantville in the wake of a chemical fire—is dragging on, shaking his confidence and raising doubts about him within this upwardly mobile black community on Houston's north side. Though Jay still believes in doing what's right, he is done fighting other people's battles. Once he has his piece of the settlement, the single father is going to devote himself to what matters most—his children.

His plans are abruptly derailed when a female campaign volunteer vanishes on the night of Houston's mayoral election, throwing an already contentious campaign into chaos. The accused is none other than the nephew and campaign manager of one of the leading candidates—a scion of a prominent Houston family headed by the formidable Sam Hathorne. Despite all the signs suggesting that his client is guilty—and his own misgivings—Jay can't refuse when a man as wealthy and connected as Sam asks him to head up the defense. Not if he wants that new life with his kids. But he has to win.

Plunging into a shadowy world of ambitious enemies and treacherous allies armed with money, lies, and secrets, Jay reluctantly takes on his first murder trial—a case that will put him and his client, and an entire political process, on trial.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062370433
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	04/21/2015
Series:	Jay Porter Series , #2
Edition description:	Large Print
Pages:	592
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.80(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Attica Locke is the author of Black Water Rising, which was nominated for an Edgar Award, an NAACP Image Award, and a Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and was short-listed for the UK’s Orange Prize, and also the national bestseller The Cutting Season, which won an Ernest Gaines Award for Literary Excellence. She is a producer and writer on the Fox drama Empire. She is on the board of directors for the Library Foundation of Los Angeles, where she lives.

Editorial Reviews

Stellar…. As is Ms. Locke’s creative wont, the crimes at hand prove a mere prelude to darker deeds.

Wall Street Journal Best Books of the Year

Outstanding…. Ms. Locke elegantly parcels out key information about her characters one piece at a time.

Wall Street Journal

Splendid…. A thoughtful, penetrating mystery.

USA Today

Black Water Rising is a stylish, involving literary thriller with a strong emphasis on human politics and character. An auspicious debut from Attica Locke.

George Pelecanos

I was first struck by Attica Locke’s prose, then by the ingenuity of her narrative and finally and most deeply by the depth of her humanity. She writes with equal amounts grace and passion. . . . I’d probably read the phone book if her name was on the spine.

Dennis Lehane

[A] deeply nuanced story . . . As Scott Turow has done, Ms. Locke uses small, incremental deceptions to draw her main character into big and dangerous mistakes . . . Subtle and compelling.

New York Times

[A] haunting mystery, where the murder of a migrant worker brings past and present into hair’s–breadth proximity.

People

This taut thriller. . . is knitted with enough shock and awe and backroom politics to keep you reading and guessing all weekend long.

Essence

A nuanced and empathetic look at the unequal, contentious social layers of Houston’s African-American population.

Seattle Times

Compelling.... Locke, a writer and co-producer of the Fox drama “Empire,” gracefully melds politics and racial issues with greed and a family rooted in secrecy for a gripping, believable plot.

Associated Press Staff

Absorbing. . . . As she managed to do so well in her first novel, Black Water Rising, Locke draws on the past to remind her characters how much it has shaped their identities and how much it continues to shape the choices they make.

New York Times Book Review

Dripping with southern Gothic atmosphere. . . . Equal parts murder mystery and family drama, the novel also draws readers in through its considerations of African-American history and life in post-Katrina Louisiana.

USA Today

Compelling. . . . A mystery that expands the whole idea of the mystery, reaching from the present deeply into the past. . . . Great writing, the kind that gives you goose bumps.

Los Angeles Times

Locke, a sharp and gifted writer, delivers a complex, suspenseful legal thriller that offers a sophisticated appraisal of our deeply flawed political process, one that is likely to resound with readers.

Starred Booklist

Locke knows how to craft a thrilling story…. With Pleasantville she’s crafted a legal thriller that shifts between personal tragedy and political corruption always with an eye on the subtle detail or the big reveal.

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Outstanding…. Ms. Locke elegantly parcels out key information about her characters one piece at a time.

Wall Street Journal

Locke makes every scene count with a complex plot that unfolds surprises at every turn and packs a satisfying conclusion.... Highly recommended for fans of fast-paced mysteries with strong geographic angles and appealing underdogs.

Amy Brozio-Andrews

02/02/2015
Locke’s gripping thriller opens on election night 1996, when a teenage girl disappears from Pleasantville, a predominantly black Houston suburb. Her body is found, raising eerie comparisons to two other unsolved murders, and attorney Jay Porter, introduced in 2009’s Black Water Rising, reluctantly agrees to represent murder suspect Neal Hathorne. Neal, the grandson of Pleasantville power broker Sam Hathorne, is campaign manager for his uncle, who’s facing a run-off mayoral election against the district attorney whose office is prosecuting Neal—raising the possibility that the murder charge, based on flimsy evidence, is a political stunt. Jay, a former civil rights activist struggling to keep his law practice afloat, navigates a convoluted maze of dark money, family secrets, and high-powered manipulation that threatens his and his loved ones’ safety. Locke rushes her treatment of the murders and a subplot about the pregnancy of Jay’s teenage daughter’s best friend, but the twist-filled plot will keep readers eagerly turning the pages. Agent: Richard Abate, 3 Arts Entertainment. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

Stellar…. As is Ms. Locke’s creative wont, the crimes at hand prove a mere prelude to darker deeds.” — Wall Street Journal Best Books of the Year

“Outstanding…. Ms. Locke elegantly parcels out key information about her characters one piece at a time.” — Wall Street Journal

“Splendid…. A thoughtful, penetrating mystery.” — USA Today

“This taut thriller. . . is knitted with enough shock and awe and backroom politics to keep you reading and guessing all weekend long.” — Essence

“A nuanced and empathetic look at the unequal, contentious social layers of Houston’s African-American population.” — Seattle Times

“Compelling.... Locke, a writer and co-producer of the Fox drama “Empire,” gracefully melds politics and racial issues with greed and a family rooted in secrecy for a gripping, believable plot.” — Associated Press

“Locke knows how to craft a thrilling story…. With Pleasantville she’s crafted a legal thriller that shifts between personal tragedy and political corruption always with an eye on the subtle detail or the big reveal.” — Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

“Locke, a sharp and gifted writer, delivers a complex, suspenseful legal thriller that offers a sophisticated appraisal of our deeply flawed political process, one that is likely to resound with readers.” — Starred Booklist

“A thriller wrapped in an involving story of community and family dynamics. Locke serves up a panorama of nuanced characters and writes with intelligence and depth.” — Kirkus Reviews

“Gripping…a twist-filled plot will keep readers eagerly turning the pages.” — Publishers Weekly

Locke makes every scene count with a complex plot that unfolds surprises at every turn and packs a satisfying conclusion.... Highly recommended for fans of fast-paced mysteries with strong geographic angles and appealing underdogs. — Library Journal (starred)

“[A] deeply nuanced story . . . As Scott Turow has done, Ms. Locke uses small, incremental deceptions to draw her main character into big and dangerous mistakes . . . Subtle and compelling.” — New York Times

“Attica Locke’s first novel, Black Water Rising, which Janet Maslin called ‘subtle and compelling’ in The New York Times, is an even better book than its author had in mind...The book cleverly replaces the kind of cold-war paranoia that used to animate thrillers with racial paranoia instead.” — New York Times

“Locke deftly moves between past and present action . . . [putting] her in the company of master thriller writers such as Dennis Lehane or Scott Turow. . . . Attica Locke [is] a writer wise beyond her years.” — Los Angeles Times

“Black Water Rising is a stylish, involving literary thriller with a strong emphasis on human politics and character. An auspicious debut from Attica Locke.” — George Pelecanos, author of The Turnaround

“I was first struck by Attica Locke’s prose, then by the ingenuity of her narrative and finally and most deeply by the depth of her humanity. She writes with equal amounts grace and passion. . . . I’d probably read the phone book if her name was on the spine.” — Dennis Lehane

“The impressively astute Attica Locke writes . . . in much the same way that Mr. Lehane [does]. . . . Each is willing to use the murder mystery as a framework for much more ambitious, atmospheric fiction.” — New York Times

“Dripping with southern Gothic atmosphere. . . . Equal parts murder mystery and family drama, the novel also draws readers in through its considerations of African-American history and life in post-Katrina Louisiana.” — USA Today

“Compelling. . . . A mystery that expands the whole idea of the mystery, reaching from the present deeply into the past. . . . Great writing, the kind that gives you goose bumps.” — Los Angeles Times

“Absorbing. . . . As she managed to do so well in her first novel, Black Water Rising, Locke draws on the past to remind her characters how much it has shaped their identities and how much it continues to shape the choices they make.” — New York Times Book Review

“[A] haunting mystery, where the murder of a migrant worker brings past and present into hair’s–breadth proximity. ” — People

From the Publisher

This taut thriller. . . is knitted with enough shock and awe and backroom politics to keep you reading and guessing all weekend long.

Essence

Compelling.... Locke, a writer and co-producer of the Fox drama “Empire,” gracefully melds politics and racial issues with greed and a family rooted in secrecy for a gripping, believable plot.

Associated Press

Locke deftly moves between past and present action . . . [putting] her in the company of master thriller writers such as Dennis Lehane or Scott Turow. . . . Attica Locke [is] a writer wise beyond her years.

|Los Angeles Times

★ 04/01/2015
Jay Porter is winding down his law career—it's time, he thinks; his wife has died, progress on one of his last big cases seems to have slowed to a crawl via court appeals, and he's lost the fire to ever set foot in a courtroom again. But when the scion of one of Pleasantville's founding families is charged with murder after a teenage campaign worker disappears on election night, Jay can't quite help himself. With only the slightest push from Pleasantville's elite, he is suddenly defending a criminal case that intersects election law, too. Jay's Hail Mary in the case unearths more than he, or any of Pleasantville's residents, had bargained for. Locke's third book and the second featuring the deeply sympathetic Jay Porter (Black River Rising) is an enthralling multilayered thriller that captures the zeitgeist of a shifting sociopolitical landscape in a historically black suburban community in Texas in the mid-1990s. Locke makes every scene count with a complex plot that unfolds surprises at every turn and packs a satisfying conclusion. VERDICT Highly recommended for fans of fast-paced mysteries with strong geographic angles and appealing underdogs. [See Prepub Alert, 10/13/14.]—Amy Brozio-Andrews, Albany P.L., NY

Library Journal

There's so much going on in Pleasantville, a Houston neighborhood built for African-Americans after WWII—murder, kidnapping, and most of all politics, specifically the election of the city's first black mayor. JD Jackson's narration is so solid and organized that listeners get the complete picture, despite the many distractions. A teenage girl turns up missing a short time before the election, and ultimately her murder becomes a political football. Attorney Jay Porter, hero of BLACK WATER RISING, is back to defend a candidate’s son who is charged with the killing. There are a multitude of accents throughout this thriller, and Jackson handles them with precision. He makes Porter a star in the inevitable murder trial, and his narration picks up speed in the latter part of the story. A.L.H. © AudioFile 2015, Portland, Maine

JUNE 2015 - AudioFile

2015-02-05
Race, politics and petty grievances muddy the quest for justice when a young election volunteer is kidnapped and murdered.On election night 1996, in the primarily African-American area of Pleasantville, in the north of Houston, a young woman named Alicia Nowell is chased by a mystery figure. That same night, the home of attorney Jay Porter (Black Water Rising, 2009) is broken into. The police are blasé. After they leave, a young intruder comes out of hiding. Jay brandishes his gun but allows the kid to get away. In the absence of a clear election winner, a runoff pits Jay's candidate, former police chief Axel Hathorne, against Sandy Wolcott, a "political upstart."Jay attends a community meeting about the missing girl, who's the third one in recent memory, though the police haven't aggressively investigated the earlier two. He's particularly worried because he's raising his teenage daughter, Ellie, as a single parent. Everyone is surprised when Axel's nephew Neal is arrested. Jay agrees to represent him, and his investigator, Lonnie, learns that the police are monitoring hotheaded Alonzo Hollis as a person of interest. As Jay begins to track Hollis, the wheels of justice turn, and Alicia's body is found. Former Houston mayor Cynthia Maddox, who may have higher ambitions, arrives with Secret Service protection to urge Jay to drop the case. Instead of complying, he prepares for the trial, which unfolds with methodical precision, the final picture taking shape piece by piece. The killer's identity is a genuine surprise. A thriller wrapped in an involving story of community and family dynamics. Locke serves up a panorama of nuanced characters and writes with intelligence and depth.

Kirkus Reviews