{"id":14425,"date":"2019-12-02T18:44:53","date_gmt":"2019-12-02T23:44:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/?p=14425"},"modified":"2019-12-03T00:45:51","modified_gmt":"2019-12-03T05:45:51","slug":"martin-clark","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/2019\/12\/02\/martin-clark\/","title":{"rendered":"In Martin Clark\u2019s \u2018Substitution Order,\u2019 A Bedraggled Attorney Gets Caught In A Con"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kevin Moore had been a star attorney, beloved by his clients as well as fellow lawyers, judges, probation officers and other esteemed members of the legal establishment. But at the beginning of Martin Clark\u2019s crackling screwball legal con artist comedy \u201cThe Substitution Order\u201d<\/a> (Knopf), his career has self-destructed after a three-month cocaine binge concluded with him startled awake in a stripper\u2019s bed as drug cops bust in to raid the place.<\/p>\n

Now Moore is on probation, he can\u2019t practice law, his wife is divorcing him, and his job is making sandwiches at a sub shop. As he sees it, he\u2019s doing his penance, demonstrating that he\u2019s cleaned up and committed to self-improvement.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s until a con man saunters in, calling himself Caleb Opportunity, and threatens Moore with a malpractice suit for failing to close a real estate deal for a client when he was zonked on cocaine. The accusation is bogus, Martin insists, and he tells the guy off. Mr. Opportunity says if Moore just plays along, they\u2019ll pay him $250,000 and use their political pull to get Moore\u2019s law license restored. Moore tells him off again. \u201cThe train, Kevin, is coming,\u201d Mr. Opportunity warns. \u201cYou want to write on it or you want it to run over you?\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Martin<\/a>
Martin Clark. (DHC Photography)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The scam registers as so far fetched that it\u2019s hard to take seriously\u2014whether you\u2019re Moore or the reader. But then a new probation officer shows up. Even though Moore has been clean from drugs for a year, the officer plants drugs and a gun in Moore\u2019s car and rigs a drug test so that Moore fails. Now even his friends have trouble trusting the word of this recovering attorney against the probation officer\u2019s frame job.<\/p>\n

The story turns into one of those cunningly knotty confidence games, full of twists and trap doors, all recounted with humor and aplomb. It\u2019s like a Virginia legal world version of one of Carl Hiaasen\u2019s Florida crime shenanigans. Moore and his friends are delightful company, deliciously wicked with the law, but down to earth, flirty, good humored, forgiving, good hearted. In other words, for all the author\u2019s narrative exaggerations, they feel like three-dimensional portrayals of grownups. (This is an improvement over Martin\u2019s previous novels in which characters have often been too movie star pretty. And skip his first novel \u201cThe Many Aspects of Mobil Home Living,\u201d which is tainted by violent misogyny.)<\/p>\n

Moore keeps thinking he can outwit the con artists, only to\u2014again!\u2014unhappily discover that he\u2019s not hit rock bottom, yet.<\/p>\n

\""The<\/a>
“The Substitution Order” by Martin Clark. (Knopf)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There are various baddies involved in the con, but the book\u2019s major villains are crooked systems\u2014an insurance industry designed to rake in fortunes by avoiding paying for medical care\u2014a legal system that crushes little folks with righteous fervor because society has more faith in familiar stories and stereotypes than in the complicated facts. That the author of these sentiments is a retired Virginia circuit court judge does not inspire optimism for our society.<\/p>\n

I won\u2019t reveal the plot turns, but when a friend tracks down Moore to explain how it all turns out, the friend is grinning and hollering, \u201cYou sun of a gun.\u201d It\u2019s hard not to smile and laugh out loud too. It\u2019s the sort of delightful tall tale that leaves you itching to read more from Martin Clark.<\/p>\n

\n

If this is the kind of coverage of arts, cultures and activisms you appreciate, please support Wonderland by contributing to Wonderland on Patreon<\/a>. And sign up for our free, weekly newsletter<\/a> so that you don’t miss any of our reporting.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Kevin Moore had been a star attorney, beloved by his clients as well as fellow lawyers, judges, probation officers and other esteemed members of the legal establishment. But at the beginning of Martin Clark\u2019s crackling screwball legal con artist comedy \u201cThe Substitution Order\u201d (Knopf), his career has self-destructed after a three-month cocaine binge concluded with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14428,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[107],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14425"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14425"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14429,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14425\/revisions\/14429"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}