William Lashner's "Victor Carl" Series Earns Author Loyal Reader

I am always reading a book, usually something in the mystery/thriller genre. I ran across William Lashner's series by accident, buying a single book from a bargain bin. Upon finishing it, I promptly went online and ordered the entire series. It quickly became my all-around favorite series and I frequently pulled quotes - funny or reflective - from its pages to share with friends.

William Lashner is mostly known for his series featuring Philadelphia lawyer Victor Carl. Before becoming a novelist, Lashner himself was a criminal prosecutor with the Department of Justice in Washington D.C. He is a graduate of NYU School of Law and lives in Philadelphia, where the bulk of the Victor Carl series takes place.

Victor Carl is a rather ordinary man who often finds himself in the most extraordinary circumstances. Lashner has a talent for making the impossible seem possible; not in the "if you can dream it, you can do it" sense, but rather far-fetched scenarios that would never happen, yet they seem perfectly logical in Victor Carl's life. Who else is drugged, bound, and kidnapped, only to wake up hours later unscathed, with their bothersome dental work completed by their captor?

Victor is a money-hungry, power-hungry, egotistical, smarmy defense lawyer who's never met a television camera he doesn't like. He really doesn't have any money or power. He doesn't have any friends and not much family. He's not an especially good lawyer. But this polyester-tie wearing semi-loser usually comes out as almost a hero to those who he represents.

At his core, Victor is a good man. He's often torn between doing what he really wants to do (usually something that could result in money), and the right thing to do. Deep down, Victor has a good heart. In every situation, even when it seems that Victor is taking the wrong (greedy) path, it's hard not to root for him to succeed, as he is very much real and flawed, like any of us.

Lashner fills his novels with colorful characters, outlandish situations, and often dark circumstances, but he writes with humor, as Victor is a sarcastic and sometimes inappropriate character. However, Lashner often very eloquently gets to the heart of the matter with truths that lurk in the back of all our minds. These are often shown in Victor's reflections on his own shortcomings, such as:

"More than anything in this world, I wish I had been born rich. It would have made up for everything. I'd still be ugly, sure, but I'd be rich and ugly. I'd still be weak and dim and tongue-tied with women, but I'd be rich enough for them not to care. I'd no longer be a social misfit, I'd be eccentric. And most of all, I'd no longer be what I was, I'd be something different." (Bitter Truth)

"My great fear in this life didn't have a name that I knew of. I was afraid of remaining exactly who I was, and that phobia instilled a shiver of fear into every one of my days. Something as simple as a fear of cats would have been a blessing." (Bitter Truth)

I've read the entire Victor Carl series, and my favorite would be a tie between "Falls the Shadow" and "Marked Man." "Falls the Shadow" centers around a dentist who ingrains himself in people's lives and fancies himself a great fixer, and not just with dental work. Whether he's playing matchmaker, instigating fights to make a couple appreciate each other more, or missing people, the dentist feels he is doing right and good. But when Victor discovers that one of his "fixes" has gone wrong, he's out to prove that the dentist isn't as wonderful as everyone thinks he is. As usual, there are two sides to every story, and Victor has to wonder if the dentist's good outweighs this one very bad result.

"Marked Man" is a darker, more depressing tale, centering around a long-ago robbery that oddly coincides with the disappearance of a young girl. One of the perpetrators has been on the run for many years, but his dying mother has asked him to come home to say goodbye. Victor is trying to broker a deal to lighten his sentence, while keeping him hidden from uncooperative prosecutors and unknown hired men who want him dead for reasons not yet known. As the story unravels, it's sad to see how lives have fallen apart, how opportunities are lost, how people have died - and all for nothing.

One of my favorite quotes from "Marked Man" conveys this feeling of being trapped by fate:

"And I guess what was bothering me the most was that he had blasted away the fiction with which I had justified the weakness in myself that seemed to stay my hand whenever I was finally reaching for the life I so desired. Sure I always had my reasons, failure always does, but underlying the hesitancy was a belief I somehow couldn't shake. We are what we are, we can't transform ourselves, the die is cast and we play out our fates. I might hit upon the million-dollar case, I might stumble upon the love of my life, something hard and clean might fall into my lap and change everything, but it really wouldn't change anything. I'd still be Victor Carl, I'd still be second tier and second class, I'd still be less than I ever hoped to be."

Lashner's clear understanding and depiction of what motivates people and moral struggles coupled with wit and humor with an unforgettable, highly-quotable lead character make him my favorite novelist.