Can Justice Save the Earth from Extinction?

Maxine Justice is an ambulance-chasing lawyer desperate for relevance and cash when aliens hire her to represent them before the United Nations. An off-planet consortium wants to heal humanity of every natural disease in exchange for 30% of Earth’s gold reserves.

The deal launches Max to legal stardom and makes her an international target for assassins. New Pharma, Sky Cross, MediCorp—the big medical companies all have good reasons to want Max out of the way. Worse, she discovers her alien clients may be planning something more sinister than anyone has imagined.

Can a lawyer who failed the bar exam three times find some way to save the world from global and interstellar conspiracies? Or will humankind’s future end in a galactic courtroom?

My thoughts: I was immediately pulled into Maxine's story. When struggling to make ends meet with her fledging firm puts her in night court to pay the bills, she little realizes that the minor cases will put her in the crosshairs of the big companies in the galaxy. With assassins hot on her trail, Maxine must decide if seeking justice is worth everything to her.

I thought that the premise of the story was interesting. There is a lot of legalese in the story, but I thought that the author did a good job of mixing in humor and relatable cases to make it flow. I enjoyed the unique setting of this story and would recommend it for readers who enjoy Science fiction or legal stories.

I received this book from Celebrate Lit. This is my honest review.

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About the Author

Author-Dan-web-08 Daniel Schwabauer, M.A., is a lifelong reader of speculative fiction. He studied the genre under science fiction great James Gunn before graduating with honors from Kansas University’s Masters program in Creative Writing. Winner of the Eric Hoffer and Ben Franklin awards for his middle grade fantasy series, The Legends of Tira-Nor, Daniel enjoys riding his motorcycle on country roads and pondering other worlds. He lives in Kansas City with his wife and dog.

More from Daniel

What in the World is a Galactic Attorney?

Maxine Justice: Galactic Attorney started as a short story concept I began twenty-five years ago but never finished. Back then I thought it would be interesting to write about a hostile takeover of the planet by aliens. But instead of using advanced weaponry and space ships, my aliens would conquer Earth the way modern corporations subsume smaller competitors—through the law.

The main problem with my original story idea was the lack of a suitable hero. It wasn’t until 2018 that an off-handed remark from my daughter provided the inspiration I needed to rethink the entire storyline, and an irrepressible, snarky young lawyer named Maxine strode into my imagination and began a hostile takeover of her own.

Yes, this story was going to have aliens in it, but the aliens were not humanity’s real problem. Our real problem was the medical industry. And the insurance industry. And the Department of Justice. And the whole legal profession. Our real problem was ourselves. (Maxine’s problem was that she had no money and no clients, though she did have an axe to grind and a very good reason to give it a fine edge.)

What if Maxine’s search for real solutions to our most corrupt systems led her to realize that Earth’s doom may not come through the cleverness of intergalactic adversaries, but via the corruption of its apex predator?

Could Justice save Earth from extinction then?