The Cinderella Plan: A Burton & Lamb Case

By Abi Silver

When the only thing worse than being found guilty...is being found not guilty
'Tense thriller wrought from a cutting-edge subject' - The Times
James Salisbury, the owner of a British car manufacturer, ploughs his 'self-drive' vehicle into a young family, with deadly consequences. Will the car's 'black box' reveal what really happened or will the industry, poised to launch these products to an eager public, close ranks to cover things up?
James himself faces a personal dilemma. If it's proved that he was driving the car, he may go to prison. But if he's found innocent, and the autonomous car is to blame, the business he has spent most of his life building, and his dream of safer transport for all, may collapse.
Lawyers Judith Burton and Constance Lamb team up once again, this time to defend a man who may not want to go free, in a case that asks difficult questions about the speed at which technology is taking over our lives.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lightning Books
• Release date: May 7, 2021
• ISBN: 9781785631283

Abi Silver

Abi Silver was born in Leeds and is a lawyer by profession. Her first courtroom drama featuring the legal duo Judith Burton and Constance Lamb, The Pinocchio Brief, was published by Lightning Books in 2017 and was shortlisted for the Waverton Good Read Award. Since then she has published four more in the acclaimed series – The Aladdin Trial, The Cinderella Plan, The Rapunzel Act, and The Midas Game, – and counting. She lives in Hertfordshire with her husband and three sons. . Read more about Abi and her work at www.abisilver.co.uk.

Reviews for The Cinderella Plan

[adonisguilfoyle · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Ehhh. I was drawn in by the AI angle, but should have paid more attention to the 'legal thriller' subtitle. Abi Silver is a lawyer, so she knows her stuff and the courtroom scenes were well-paced, but shaping the characters into believeable people would have helped to perk up the rest of the story. I feel like the author picked an article about autonomous vehicles from a newspaper and decided to build a novel around the barest facts, without bothering to add too much flesh to the technological bones.James Salisbury is the CEO of a company which builds autonomous vehicles, or cars which drive themselves (like Knight Rider, but without the personality). He is being driven by one of his fleet, which alternates between manual and autonomous control, when a family of a mother, two obnoxious children and a baby in a pram steps into the road in front of his car. The two children are killed and an investigation begins - not to mention a moral dilemma for James. He claims he can't remember the accident, but faces jail if he was driving and the failure of his company and vision for the future if the car was in control. So far, so intriguing. After the first dramatic chapter, however, the bulk of the book is a boring combination of meetings and backstory. The Laytons never really convinced me as a grieving family - the best scene for me was the mother's post-verdict admission, which was hinted at earlier on and which I couldn't help but sympathise with. Those were some annoying kids! The two lawyers, Judith and Constance, have probably been introduced in the first novel, so I can't really comment on their personalities or lack thereof, but the other characters were all stereotypes - the noble CEO, fashionista trophy wife, frustrated mother of young kids, protegee bearing a grudge, etc. I didn't care about any of them.Some great concepts, well-researched - and I would buy a self-driving car, even if a few children had to be sacrificed - but not exactly a thrilling read.