Book Log 2021 #24: The Last Trial by Scott Turow

After a long and storied career as a criminal defense attorney in Kindle County, Sandy Stern prepares to represent his final client, a longtime friend and Nobel laureate whose cancer drug gave Stern a new lease on life... before it was found to have potentially killed several patients. Working with his daughter Marta (who has already announced that she will retire and close their firm at the end of the case), Stern has to plot a defense while also battling the physical and mental infirmities that can come with advanced age.

The legal thriller part of the book is solid as usual, but it's the parts that deal with the looming end of Sandy's career that made it stand out. We don't often see aging in real(ish) time in series like this, and seeing how Sandy confronts the end of his career and looming mortality adds a dimension to the book that would otherwise be missing. Hopefully some of the other characters will get a similar valedictory novel.