Catherine O'Rourke is a popular crime reporter, but when she has disturbing visions that give details about a series of murders, she becomes suspect number one. Randy Singer's novel By Reason of Insanity explores the world of multiple personality disorder, or dissociative identity disorder (DID) to consider whether someone could be a serial killer and not realize it.
Murder is the farthest thing from Catherine's mind, but when evidence seems to finger her, and her lawyers suggest that a claim of insanity related to DID is all that could get her off the hook, she begins to have serious doubts about her own innocence. The victims are rapists, or lawyers who defended rapists. Catherine grapples with a rape in her own past, so the suggestion that she may be exacting revenge does not seem that far-fetched.
Singer puts together the investigation and trial nicely, as he does in his novels. His trial experience shows, bringing a sense of realism to the courtroom scenes. I enjoyed the interactions of the two lawyers who are compelled to work together in Catherine's defense. The DID angle seemed a bit overwrought. While it's interesting to consider the possibility that someone could function as more than one person, none of whom is aware of the other, I thought very little about Catherine's story lent itself to a consideration of DID.
Even though Singer writes for a Christian publisher, there was little Christian content in By Reason of Insanity. I don't say that as a criticism, just an observation. Singer is definitely a writer of legal fiction to whom I will return.
No comments:
Post a Comment