Rating: 
Summary: An Excellent Novel: Patterson's Best Yet
Review: PROTECT AND DEFEND is one of the most intelligent and exciting novels I have ever read. I couldn't put this book down. This book is what good writing is all about. It has drama, suspense and believability. The character development of all of the main players is superb. I think that this may be Patterson's best book to date.Kerry Kilcannon is the new President of the United States of America. Caroline Masters is the President's nominee as the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. The nomination is not well received by a conservative Senate led by Majority Leader and presidential aspirant Macdonald Gage; and Gage sets about to defeat the nomination by any means necessary. Set against this backdrop is an ongoing trial (nationally televised) involving the pregnant teenage daughter of Christian fundamentalist parents challenge to the constitutionality of a law passed by Congress called the Protection of Life Act: favored by anti-abortionists groups and disfavored by pro-choice groups. Richard North Patterson has created a well-researched novel about the current political issues of our times. PROTECT AND DEFEND challenges our notions about campaign reform, abortion and whether or not those who aspire to public office have any right to or expectation of any modicum of privacy in their private lives. Reading this book will lead you out of the grip of any unconsidered opinion you may have had about these issues. A thoughtful reader will find here a certain level of skepticism that lifts the mind out of all certainties but doesn't then corrupt it with cynicism. Be sure to read Patterson's acknowledgements at the end of the book. It will give you insight into why this novel was so well crafted.
Rating: 
Summary: strong work, excellent research but needed editing
Review: Richard North Patterson is a compelling storywriter, and up to this point, I have found his books to be wonderfully executed and gripping. However, Patterson should return to the "thriller/murder cases" and get out of this pontification on abortion and seedy politicians. Caroline Masters and Kerry Killcannon, who I sincerely enjoyed in their previous appearances, are now given halos and are so saintly and self-righteous, they are nauseating.
First off, Kerry, being a Catholic insinuates that he is pro-life, but defends the rights of those who aren't. As a Catholic, he's forgetting that abortion is not condoned, and if he wants to walk the walk, he needs to stand behind that; otherwise, he becomes a hypocrite, as indeed he does in this book. He is not the vital force evidenced in "No Safe Place," and he merely appears smug, determined to do whatever he wants in the name of doing what is right. He even sends the FBI after information from a newspaper doing a story on the trial. It's okay, Kerry says, to break the law, if you're noble in doing it.
All of the political backstabbing gets extremely tiresome, and so overdrawn, it's cartoonish.
However, it is the Mary Ann Tierney story that proves Patterson's pro-choice stance, and in this book, everyone who is prochoice is either mentally ill, outright cruel, insensitive and wrong. Meanwhile the prochoice people behave so magnaimously, and they are portrayed as the victims. Heading this farce of a philosophy is young, FEMALE Sarah Dash, who takes in Mary Ann when her parents continue to force her into having her baby, even though it will probably be born dead, and Mary Ann may never have any more children. Stacked deck indeed.
First off, Mary is only 15; she had sex with her boyfriend in the back of his car; he didn't use a condom because it wasn't as much fun. She says her parents never told her anything about sex. Now, she's pregnant, and all of a sudden this fifteen year old girl is something like Joan of Arc; where did all this maturity come from? And why did she neglect to tell her lawyer that her mother DID talk to her about sex, but obviously mary Ann didn't listen? Seems that her mother became sterile after having Mary Ann. Stacked deck again. Also, is it really realistic that so many people have had abortions, as evidenced by Chad Palmer and Lara soon to be Mrs. Killcannon? The death of one of the other young people just to prove how heinous the press and abortion are, is totally manipulative and ultimately a cruel plot mechanism to advance Patterson's love of Masters and Killcannon. Also, when Mary Ann finally has the abortion, wouldn't it have been interesting if the baby (not the fetus, as Patterson keeps calling it!!) would have been normal? No, Patterson is not content to pull that kind of twist.
What a sad world where abortion is so prominent; granted, this was a tough choice for Mary Ann to make, but her total disregard of her parents (who were also portrayed as evil villains) left her to make that choice alone.
I really disliked this book; and I will not read any more of Mr. Patterson's treatises on abortion or gun control. If he sticks to his earlier works, I'll certainly continue to enjoy them, but I don't want to be exposed to such one-sided partisan views in my entertainment.
NOT RECOMMENDED.
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