WOMEN IN JUSTICE
There are four women in my new novel, JUSTICE . . . five if you include the President, but her role is mostly behind the scenes. The most interesting may be the character of Mari. She comes to New Orleans from the Island of Martinique in 1959 at age 20 to work in the home of one of the politically powerful families there. She’s remarkably beautiful, and has a presence that for several years enables her to rise above the issues facing a black woman in the South in the 1950’s. Her daughter, Joan, has some of those same qualities, and goes on to become a successful trial lawyer in Washington, while Mari insists on lying-low in Chicago’s Southside. Mari lives for, and vicariously through, her daughter. When Joan is chosen as the President’s choice to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court, Mari’s past comes back to haunt them both. I freed myself of any restraints and let it all hang out when Joan goes back to New Orleans to confront her mother’s employer.
Julia Gold is an interesting, very modern, woman, and the person in the Homicide Division of the Chicago Police Department with responsibility to solve the murder of a young journalist. She’s up against the usual factual issues present in solving any murder, but she also has to battle City Hall to solve the crime. She’s living evidence of a saying I first heard Law School . . . it’s better to be lucky than smart. Julia has both going for her.
The fourth would be Kate, who travels with me from Havana Passage, along with her fiancée, Gordon Cox. Kate’s character is the bridge between the three critical points of the plot . . . Julia in Chicago, Gordon’s doings with the White House, and the Supreme Court where Kate is a law clerk to the Justice who’s retiring. She also knew the murdered journalist, and is driven to solve the real mystery of his death.
I kept the same White House we saw in Havana Passage. I want to avoid appearing to have a political agenda. Havana Passage came out during the Bush years and this is now. I had fun taking Joan through the Senate confirmation process.
