I’ve been reading the later books in the Marc Kadella series of legal thrillers (set in Minneapolis), and enjoying them with some reservations. So when I got a deal on a package of the first three books, I bought it. Not sure what I was getting. I had the idea the first books might be a little clumsy. Instead I found that The Key to Justice, the opening novel, was remarkably good and wickedly entertaining.

The book opens with Jake Waschke, an honest, respected Minneapolis police detective. He’s half-brother to the governor’s chief aide, a troubled young man whom he has protected all his life. Now he faces a horrific problem. A knife-wielding serial killer is raping and murdering young women in the Twin Cities (including the governor’s daughter), and Jake knows his brother is doing it. So he selects Carl Fornich, a scumbag with a past rape conviction, and fakes evidence to get him prosecuted.

Carl’s brother comes to Marc Kadella for a defense. Marc is a struggling, small-time lawyer. He needs all the business he can get, especially because he’s involved in countersuing the US government in a tax case and it’s taking forever. Though the prospects of collecting a lot from Carl’s family seem small. But when Marc meets Carl, he’s convinced he’s innocent. If he is, that means the police are framing him. Which makes Marc mad.

In his Introduction, author Dennis Carstens informs us that one of his main motivations for writing the story was to dramatize the un-glamorous side of the practice of law. The long hours, the tedium, the difficulties in getting paid, the official arrogance that has to be swallowed. And that element was in fact one of the things I’ve liked about the books all along.

But to be frank, the later books have gotten a little formulaic. This first one is genuinely original. Lots of surprises and twists, and very dark irony. Carstens isn’t a great prose stylist (and he has a real problem with punctuation), but he can tell a heck of a story.

Also, thanks to his stinginess with character description, I’ve never known what the beautiful Maddy (Marc’s investigator, later his girlfriend) looks like . Now I know she’s tall, brunette, and blue-eyed. Good to know.

Recommended, with the usual cautions.