I’ve reviewed one or two of Paul Levine’s Jake Lassiter novels before. The books irritate me a little, but they also entertain me a great deal, and I generally recommend them.

Last Chance Lassiter is a prequel. It goes back to tell the story of how Miami lawyer Jake Lassiter came to be in practice on his own.

When the book begins, he’s a round peg in a square hole. A former pro football player whose lasting fame comes from making a wrong-way run on national TV, he’s earned his law degree and joined a high-priced firm, which values him primarily for his contributions to its touch football team. He refuses to dress like a lawyer, refuses to decorate his office like a lawyer, and is not beyond getting physical with a prospective client who offends him.

Soon he’s no longer working for that firm.

So he sets up in a tiny, windowless office in a parking ramp, and screens a string of unpromising clients. Then a woman comes in, the granddaughter of a famous but impoverished blues singer, asking him to help them sue a rap star who seems to have plagiarized one of the old man’s songs. This is a case Jake believes in and he throws himself into it, even though he’ll be up against his old employers, and knows them to be smart, ruthless, and very well capitalized, unlike himself. Jakes first case just might be his last.

Last Chance Lassiter was a fast read, and I enjoyed it a lot, even though I wanted to slap Jake upside the head occasionally. His “loose cannon, plays by his own rules” act has been done a thousand times, and I grew bored with it long ago. Jake even sets it up as his professional motto: “I live by no laws but my own.” This is moral hooey. It never seems to occur to him that his corrupt former employers live by exactly the same motto.

Still, plenty of fun, and lots of fighting for the underdog. Cautions for language and sexual situations.