The Trials of Kate Hope

by Wick Downing

Overview

A teen lawyer stars in a novel that “portrays a girl possessing power in the actual world, trusting her own mind and conscience and sense of justice” (Los Angeles Times).
 
When she was not yet a teenager, Kate Hope started “reading law” in the office of “Judge” Hope, her half-blind grandfather, a grumpy eighty-nine-year-old lawyer with problems. One big problem is that he believes in justice for all, not just those who can afford it. He also needs a partner. Together they find a loophole in Colorado law, and Kate becomes a lawyer—technically. She has a law license hanging on the wall in her office, but she has no idea how to practice law. In a courtroom. With a judge and jury and defendants.
 
It doesn’t help that things don’t start out so well for Kate’s legal career. The firm of Hope and Hope has an unusual first case, and if they lose it, a dog named Herman—the only friend an old woman has—will be destroyed. But Kate’s grandfather falls ill, leaving her to try the case on her own. Will Kate be able to save Herman from doggy death row? Will Grandfather Hope recover in time to make it to the courtroom? Will life ever be normal again for Kate Hope? Will justice be served?
 
“The social issues of the day flavor the narrative, which is also laden with legal detail and discussions of justice that will appeal to aficionados of courtroom dramas . . . a unique premise.” —School Library Journal
 
“Entertaining . . . Educational.” —Kliatt

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780547528335
Publisher:	Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Publication date:	04/17/2019
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	341
Lexile:	760L (what's this?)
File size:	576 KB
Age Range:	12 - 18 Years

About the Author

Wick Downing, three-time winner of the Colorado Author's League Top Hand Award for fiction, lives in Denver.

Read an Excerpt

SUMMER 1973

If I'm ever famous and someone writes the story of my life, they'll highlight this very day. "On Monday morning, June 11, 1973,” the story would say, “with Mount Evans looming on the horizon west of Denver, fourteen-year- old Kate Hope put in her first full day as a lawyer." Unfortunately for the course of human history, Mom stood in the driveway and had me blocked. "How am I supposed to get to work?" I asked her as I straddled my ten-speed.
"The bus," she said. "Or let me take you, even though you can't stand doing anything the easy way." "There's nothing very hard about riding a bicycle." "Honey, won't you just let me drop you off on my way to work? I hate it when you're out there dodging cars!" "I don't dodge them." I stuffed my foot into the toe clip of the bike pedal and pulled the strap down. "They dodge me." I have Grandmother Hope’s genes, everyone says. Like her, I'm only five feet tall, and like her, I have attitude.
"Kate, you scare me to death,” she said, inhaling deeply on a cigarette. My own mother smokes! She started smoking again exactly when all her friends quit.
"I'd rather get crushed by a bus than die of lung cancer," I told her, guiding my bike around her and pushing off down the slope of the driveway. I rolled into Hudson Street and banked a hard right, then bent down and tightened the strap over my other toe. "See you tonight!" I was halfway to Sixth Avenue Parkway before she could react.
"Call me when you get to the office?" she yelled after me.
What is it about my mother that makes me grit my teeth? I asked myself as I pumped my bike down Hale Parkway. I loved her, and she loved me, but she still hung on to me way too tightly. She wouldn't let me grow up! She saw me in the world she'd grown up in, but that world didn't exist anymore. Mine had body bags, and Vietnam, and Ms. magazine. I had no desire to be the nicey-nice girl who grew up next door, like Judy Garland in Easter Parade. That may have been Mom’s model for life, but it didn't work for me.
A man was riding a bike in front of me, and without thinking I cranked up to pass him. An old guy in his forties, he had a stomach that hung over his belt and he rode with his elbows locked. Would he be willing to take lessons from a fourteen-year-old girl? I could show him how to ride so that it wouldn’t rattle his brains, and could introduce him to Mom. She might take him on as a project to manage, instead of me. "Hi," I said, pulling next to him. "Beautiful morning." He glared at me. "What are you doing on a boy's bike, sweetie?" Not Mom's type, I decided. Instantly. "Is there a law?" I asked.
"Don't get smart with me," he gasped, his chest heaving with exertion as he tried to keep up.
I didn't want him to have a heart attack, but I couldn't keep my mouth shut, either. "You know something, mister?" I asked him as I pulled away. "I hope you don't have any daughters!"

Editorial Reviews

Gr 5-8- In Denver in 1973, Kate Hope, 14, has become an attorney in partnership with her grandfather after the death of her dad and brother in a car accident. The firm takes clients who are in need of representation but short of resources. At the center of the story are two cases: a man in the States on a work permit who has been charged with theft, and an elderly woman whose dog has been impounded. Kate is resourceful, deals with her grandfather's growing infirmity, and has a sometimes boyfriend who helps with investigations. The social issues of the day flavor the narrative, which is also laden with legal detail and discussions of justice that will appeal to aficionados of courtroom dramas. Although the writing is somewhat pedestrian, the book has a unique premise. In an afterword, Downing provides a legal basis for his invention of a protagonist who practices law at such a young age.-Carol A. Edwards, Denver Public Library

School Library Journal

The year is 1973. Thanks to a loophole in old territorial law and the savvy of her indomitable Grandfather, 14-year-old Kate Hope is the dubiously proud holder of a license to practice law in the state of Colorado, and on the first day of summer vacation, she rides her ten-speed to work at the offices of Hope and Hope, Esq. Her Grandfather has come out of retirement after the death of his son-Kate's father-to champion Denver's disenfranchised, much to the dismay of its Establishment. But Grandfather is old and not entirely well, so in fairly short order Kate finds herself in sole charge of a trial to defend a dotty old lady's dog from an order of destruction for viciousness. Downing spins an adequate mystery around Kate's quest to exonerate the dog and presents readers with a decent introduction to legal practice and maneuvering through Kate's experiences. But between undistinguished prose and the sheer unbelievability of the premise, this courtroom drama will have readers' credulity straining at the leash. (Fiction. 10-14)

Kirkus Reviews

April 1, 2008 Kirkus Reviews

"Entertaining...educational." May 1, 2008 KLIATT

"The social issues of the day flavor the narrative...the book as a unique premise." July 2008 School Library Journal

From the Publisher