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Summary
Summary
"Enthralling and sharp-witted...Highly recommended."
-- Karin Slaughter, New York Times and #1 international bestselling author
"Bold, fearless... Prima Facie is a deeply rewarding, absolute must read."
--Chris Whitaker, New York Times bestselling author of We Begin at the End
This is not life, this is law...
Tessa Ensler loves her job. She's worked her way up to being a top criminal defense barrister against all the odds, and fights to defend those pleading not guilty. Tessa believes in the law, believes in the system. Her quick-witted cross-examinations and intelligence in the courtroom see her clocking up win after win - including securing freedom for men accused of rape and sexual assault. Innocence until proven guilty is, after all, the bedrock of a civilized society.
But when Tessa is raped by a coworker, she struggles to find the strength to bring him to justice in the face of the barriers and opposition within that same system. Determined to have her day in court, Tessa is forced to confront the stark reality that the law was not written for victims, and that she is the one on trial. She fights on, even as her evidence is manipulated to make her look like a liar, even while she is retraumatized in the stand.
Based on the Olivier and Tony Award-winning play, Suzie Miller's Prima Facie is an unforgettable story of what happens when a victim is asked to navigate a system that is not set up to accommodate the lived experience of sexual assault survivors.
Author Notes
Suzie Miller is a contemporary international playwright, screenwriter, and novelist. Based in both London and Sydney, Australia, Miller has had her work produced around the world, winning multiple prestigious awards, including for her smash-hit one-woman play Prima Facie , which ran a sold-out, critically successful season on London's West End, winning the Laurence Olivier Awards for Best New Play 2023 and Best Actress 2023; followed by a critically successful season on Broadway, receiving four Tony Award nominations and a win for Best Actress 2023. Miller is educated in science and law, with a doctorate in drama and mathematics. She practiced human rights law before turning to writing full-time and is currently developing major theater, film, and television projects across the UK, USA, and Australia, including feature film adaptations of her plays. Prima Facie is her first novel.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
In this bracing if somewhat stilted debut, playwright Miller adapts her Olivier-winning play about London criminal defense barrister Tessa Ensler, whose fierce faith in the law is challenged after she's raped by a colleague. Though Tessa prides herself on being a champion for underdogs like her older brother, Johnny--whose juvenile run-ins with the justice system have tainted his professional prospects--she has surprisingly few qualms about defending men accused of sexual assault. Her favored tactic in these cases is superficially sympathetic but ultimately devastating cross-examinations of her client's female accusers. One night, after a bout of heavy drinking, Tessa is assaulted by a colleague with whom she's been carrying on an affair. As she wrestles with the same conundrums faced by the women she's eviscerated on the stand, the novel hits its stride on the way to a climactic courtroom showdown. Miller's narrative more than succeeds as an impassioned piece of advocacy that illuminates the tilted playing field facing sexual assault survivors. Without the immediacy of the stage, however, it can sometimes feel less like a novel than a brilliantly argued legal brief. Miller provides plenty of food for thought, but she doesn't quite nail the transition from stage to page. (Jan.)
Kirkus Review
A London lawyer's faith in the legal system is tested after she's sexually assaulted. As a criminal defense attorney, Tessa Ensler is often called upon to argue on behalf of people accused of rape. Possessed of an acute knowledge of the law and a brilliant mind (and, as she comes to realize, the default upper hand), Tessa routinely wins acquittals for her clients. She never resorts to dirty tactics such as suggesting the alleged victims "asked for it" by wearing revealing clothes; she simply teases out inconsistencies, contradictions, and other flaws in their accounts, enough to plant a seed of doubt in the jurors' minds. Her role, as she sees it, is to tell the best version of a defendant's story; the prosecutor is tasked with doing the same for the plaintiff. Then, it's up to the judge to decide which narrative is more plausible. To Tessa, the law, for all its imperfections, is truly a force for justice. If one of the clients she's successfully defended is indeed found guilty, well, the fault lies with the prosecutor for dropping the ball. Based on Miller's play of the same name, this novel considers the chasm between what Tessa terms "the legal truth" and the actual truth. Can a system built by and for wealthy white men really do right by anyone who doesn't fit that mold? Tessa's answer changes after an ill-fated date with a fellow barrister. Back at her apartment, in a violent encounter rendered in horrifyingly vivid detail (that's a compliment to Miller, not a critique), he forces himself on her, ignoring her protestations and pinning her down. More than two years later, the resulting trial begins--a chance for Tessa to not only have her day in court, but also to assess the effectiveness of the institution she upholds. While the opening chapters can drag (since we know where the plot is headed), the pivotal scene hits like a ton of bricks, evoking in full the physical and emotional horror of sexual assault and its lasting effects on the victim. A rawly moving debut filled with insights into the legal system and its shortcomings. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Playwright Miller delivers this powerful legal drama based on her 2023 Olivier and Tony award--winning play about consent and sexual assault. Tess Ensler, a top London criminal defense attorney, worked hard to transcend her working-class upbringing in a profession dominated by "barristers born into the law." The law is her life. She staunchly believes the system can deliver justice, especially for those lacking privilege. But after being raped by a colleague, Tess' faith in herself and the law shatters. Suddenly she's a victim, like the women she cross-examines in court. Miller tells the story in monologue, skillfully capturing the wrenching shift in Tess's self-sense following the assault. Wit, assurance, and logic give way to doubt, hesitancy, and bouts of panic. Seeking justice, Tess confronts a system ill-suited to the "lived experience of rape" and a defense barrister digging for inconsistencies --as Tess has done herself--to undermine her testimony. Retraumatized, her mind in turmoil, she somehow manages to reclaim her voice and speak out against a "law of sexual assault spin[ing] on the wrong axis."
Library Journal Review
DEBUT Tessa is a successful criminal-defense barrister with a winning record of defending men accused of sexual assault. A horrific event puts her on the other side of the table in Miller's compelling debut novel that adapts her Laurence Olivier--winning play of the same name, which earned four Tony nominations when it moved from UK stages to the U.S. Tessa has a consensual late-night sexual encounter with a colleague, which leads to a subsequent dinner date where both consume plenty of alcohol. They retire to Tessa's apartment and have consensual sex. Later, Tessa wakes feeling ill and retreats to the bathroom where she is sick. Her colleague carries her back to bed and when he tries to initiate sex again, she refuses, pushes him away and struggles. He holds her down and rapes her. Horrified, Tessa files charges against him, even knowing that women are often the losers in sexual-assault cases. Miller successfully captures the mental anguish and confusion of the assault itself and the horror of reliving the events in the courtroom. VERDICT Tessa is a compelling character who confronts the patriarchy. Recommended for all libraries.--Joanna M. Burkhardt
