Photograph by Michael Eastman
The book takes us into the chamber of the worst judge in the circuit court of St. Louis, and quite possibly in all of Missouri. He’s vulgar, sexist, and stupid, all of which becomes apparent when a young female attorney has to try an impossible case in front of him, with the help of a loyal friend on Washington University’s law faculty.
Granted, the book’s fiction—the ninth mystery by St. Louis lawyer Michael Kahn. It’s called The Flinch Factor, and it features his favorite detective, Rachel Gold, who he swears is not his inner-feminine alter ego. Kahn does fine with nonfiction, too: He’s been counsel of record for the National Basketball Association, Oprah Winfrey, and Paramount Pictures.
You started writing these books on a dare.
Years ago, I was representing the Hyatt corporation in that huge collapsed-skywalk case, and I was traveling back and forth. I’d read books when I traveled back and forth, and I kept saying, “I can write a better book than this!” I guess I was getting to sound like a broken record: So my wife, Margi, said, “Hon, why don’t you write a book and shut up?”
Just what gave you the chutzpah to write as a woman?
It was probably a really bad idea, from a marketing point of view. At first—you’re supposed to write about what you know, well, all I knew was being a young lawyer in a big law firm. So I wrote about a young male attorney in a big law firm. In the first person. They say all of us have one book in us, a really boring autobiographical one. I said, “Well, I can’t write.” Then I read some mysteries and realized a lot of the detectives were outsiders. One day I was in court, and this crusty old judge was really nasty to this female attorney, and I thought, “My character will be a woman.”
Was it tough to get inside a female psyche?
I must have written the first 75 pages of that novel 20 times before she really came alive. Fortunately, my wife was a woman, my agent was a woman, and my editor was a woman. And then Rachel took on a life of her own. Now, she’s like my sister.
Your characters eat at Blueberry Hill and Llywelyns and groan about a snobbish country club that’s a thinly disguised Westwood. When do you have to invent places?
Well, if you’re talking about corruption of city officials, or any other crime…
Did Judge Flinch flow from personal experience?
There are plenty of kooky judges and lawyers who probably provided inspiration. I haven’t sorted through how.
Rachel’s best friend, Benny, is a Jewish 21st-century Falstaff: vulgar, gluttonous, entirely uninhibited, and the most loyal friend you could have. How’d he come about?
I think he’s purely imagination. Margi’s convinced there’s some of me in him. [Rueful grin.] You know how you get in the zone? Late at night I was writing in the kitchen on the laptop, and I was laughing, and Margi came in and said, “What’s so funny?” I said, “You will not believe what Benny just said.”
You use your penchant for crossword puzzles to craft a denouement. How long did it take you to work out that puzzle?
Awhile!—and I only did the upper right portion. It gave me new appreciation for crossword puzzle creators.
How would you describe Rachel in 100 words?
I’d start with Professor Gerald Early’s description of her in his review of the short story collection, A Handful of Gold: “She is “‘a lawyer’s lawyer,’ the kind any distressed client dreams of having: dedicated, amazingly smart, and morally infallible—that is, if she takes your case, you are clearly on the right side of whatever principle is at stake.” While I’m flattered by that description, I would add a few caveats: Rachel is confident but not arrogant, committed but no crusader, gutsy but not macho, and someone who values loyalty above all else. I love her. Totally.
What impression do you want readers to get of St. Louis?
A good impression. One thing I try to do in every novel is to find some unusual aspect of the city and include it within the plot. The limestone caves in South City play a key role in Due Diligence, the clock tower at Union Station is involved in a critical scene in Bearing Witness, the train at the Zoo is featured in Trophy Widow, and the crazy pyramid structure atop the City Courts is the setting for a key scene in The Mourning Sexton.
Do you know any transsexuals, or is the character of Jacki just a brilliant concept?
I have absolutely no idea where Jacki came from, but I’m grateful she’s here.
Which is more fun, a good trial or writing a novel? Has the fiction informed improved your trial work in any way?
A good trial can be more exhausting and more exhilarating than writing a novel in the same way that a good hike in the Rocky Mountains can be more exhausting and exhilarating than writing an essay about such a hike. But fiction has helped me understand the basics of a trial and has helped me understand why so many writers of legal thrillers are lawyers. An effective jury trial presentation has a cast of characters (known as witnesses) presenting a compelling story based on believable facts to an impartial third party (the jury in court, the reader at home).
As Rachel Gold explains in the opening paragraph of my short story, “The Bread of Affliction,” “I know a former trial lawyer who gave it up to write courtroom thrillers. He claims he prefers the fictional kind because he gets to control the judge, the lawyers, the witnesses and, best of all, the outcome.”
What's your response to literary snobs who cast aspersions on genre fiction?
My experience with snobs in general—whether they’re snobbish about literature, wine, cars, food or music—is that they are often blinded by their own prejudices and thus unable to fully experience anything beyond their limited horizon. Margi teaches cooking and writes about food, and she can be just as ecstatic eating an unusual ethnic concoction in a little family-run Korean or Indian restaurant as she can be eating something with a French name in a fancy restaurant. Back in law school, one of our professors gave us a warning. He said that right now, as students on limited budgets, we were happy drinking our $3 bottle of Almaden wine and driving our beat-up old Honda Civics. You will be earning much more money some day, he said. You should ask yourself then whether that fancy bottle of wine that costs 10 times more than your Almaden or that fancy car that costs 10 times more than your used Honda Civic is actually delivering 10 times more bang for the buck. If it isn’t, then you’ve become a snob and an idiot.
The Flinch Factor will be released by Poisoned Pen Press on June 4. If you'd like to meet the author and get your book signed, Left Bank Books' downtown location will hold a publication party for Kahn on June 23 at 2 p.m. For more information, go to left-bank.com.
