Book Review: The Plinko Bounce by Martin Clark

If you’re a fan of legal thrillers and don’t know the name Martin Clark, it could be considered negligent, if not a criminal offense, in some circles. A retired circuit court judge from Patrick County Virginia—where he was appointed to the bench at the young age of thirty-two and served for twenty-seven years—he made his debut as a novelist with 2000’s The Many Aspects of Mobile Home Living. Called “the thinking man’s John Grisham” by The New York Times, Clark has since written five critically acclaimed standalones that have earned him a variety of accolades and bestseller status. His most recent offering is September’s The Plinko Bounce—which takes its name from The Price is Right’s game of chance.

Public defender Andy Hughes is overworked and underpaid. Having spent the last seventeen years tirelessly (and often thanklessly) advocating for society’s most downtrodden citizens, he’s ready for a change. But before he can move on to a more lucrative, less taxing position, he’s appointed to represent Damian Bullins—a violent repeat offender accused of killing Alicia Benson, the beloved wife of a prominent local businessman. Having confessed to the crime, his pants spattered with blood, it seems Bullins is destined to be convicted. But a series of unsettling discoveries—including an error in Mirandizing him fully—threatens to derail the State’s case from slam dunk to sunk.

Despite knowledge of his client’s guilt, Hughes is obligated to provide a vigorous defense by capitalizing on these missteps. And while he is bound by his ethical duty to the court (not to mention his own moral code), Bullins has no such fidelity to fairness and truth. With sights set on a hung jury, if not an outright acquittal, he recants his confession and puts the blame on the victim’s husband, whose own transgressions have the potential to blind the jury. It’s an untenable situation, made worse by the fact that the Commonwealth’s attorney is governed more by his own political ambitions and concerns over public perception than administering fair justice under the law. 

Clark ably depicts his protagonist as admirable if occasionally calculating—which can be a delicate balancing act, given the ambiguous nature of criminal defense. Beyond the stressors of his job, Hughes has a relatably conflicted personal life, which includes adopting a finnicky dog, reentering the dating world, and co-parenting his young son with his ex-wife—all of which are impacted by the dangerous nature of his association with Bullins. Covid provides an added element of realism (the narrative opens in 2020) to the story, which feels very much of its time. How everything will shake out—and just who the good guys and bad guys really are—remains in question as the author builds toward a polarizing, and arguably poetic, conclusion.

The Plinko Bounce is a masterful take on crime and the court system that’s imbued with rich characterization and resonant circumstance. More than a high stakes legal drama, it’s a story of attorney and client, father and son, man and woman, heart and head. Loyalties, like justice itself, often exist in the gray areas between black and white, where conscience and duty must find balance. And few people have the capacity to capture that more powerfully than Martin Clark.