In 1924, Leonard "Kip" Rhinelander, the scion of one of America's richest families, falls in love with a biracial young woman. The media is appalled. Upon hearing the news, Kip's father sends an ultimatum: annul the marriage at once, or lose the inheritance. And so begins Rhinelander v Rhinelander, a trial about love, seduction and deception, with the most unlikely of results given an all-white, all-male jury.

I did enjoy the initial premise of this novel: the initial setup of the trial, as well as both of the perspectives from both Len and Alice. I was especially fascinated with Len's point of view, because he is such an interesting (though, admittedly, unlikeable) character: able to take charge enough to take responsibility for Alice, but too weak to think of a lifestyle without his father funding his bank account.

It took me a week to finish this, which was a first for me — save for Infinite Jest, I have never encountered a book that seemed so never-ending. I think the biggest problem for me was that the trial was extremely repetitive, so it wasn't like the information we were given was anything new. Instead, we are constantly reminded again and again, in both monologue and long speeches, about Alice's race, Len's hypocrisy and subsequent stupidity, the white jury, racism in 1920s America, etc. I think a problem is that much of the story is told from the perspective of the lawyer, when in fact the most interesting sections are from either Len or Alice's perspectives. The legal jargon and Davis's subsequent "moral" diatribes are a chore to get through, when hardly any new content is gleaned from each chapter. Most jarring of all, Davis constantly drops what he believes are clever one-liners, which seem especially out of place, such as "with friends as these, one needs no enemies", a quote that wasn't even created until roughly the 1940-50s.

Furthermore, one thing that bothered me was while Davis claims this moral superiority, he still essentially forces Alice to strip in front of the entire court of men. Alice is so humiliated by this that she and her family fail to appear in court the entire day, and Davis sees no problem with this. I understand this reflects true events at the time, but if Davis is really so enlightened then why does he not reflect more on if this decision is right or not? Or at least dwell more on Alice's reaction?

I do think this novel could benefit from some *significant* word reduction. I do like Stratton's writing style, but he has a tendency to over-write, and his current word count is frankly ridiculous. This novel should be cut down by at least 1/3 to 1/2, which would make it readable.

This was an Advanced Reader by NetGalley. This story was based upon the true annulment/divorce trial of Leonard Rhinelander, son of a prominent New York society family, and Alice Jones, a working class Negro woman, with flash backs to how they met, fell in love. But the story goes into MUCH detail about what their lovemaking entailed. It just goes on and on, a lot of repeating. Too much for me. I thought the trial would never end. I had a difficult time staying with this – in fact I skimmed over a lot of pages.

I will provide this title with 3☆ as I wasnunable to finish and could not say I would or would not recommend this book.

From what I was able to read it is as follow:
Overall: ☆☆☆(2.8)
Writing style: ☆☆
Entertainment :☆☆
Characters:☆☆☆
Plot:☆☆☆☆
Ending:☆☆☆

I have never been so unable to finish a book, that I resorted to the internet to see how everything unfolded and then skipped to the end to see how the author ended it.

For me, I was unable to get into the novel. I read about 30% before I had to call it quits. I felt as if I was reading more of the attorney's memoir, and less of a novel.

It also was very repetitive. I know Len was sweet, I know he was his moms favorite, I know he told her to fight the case, ect, but these facts were stated, and then restated, and then stated again. And I felt like this 500+ page book could of been easily reduced to 250 pages and it would of been easier to process.

Also the vocabulary was very bombastic. I love to learn new words, but not at the expense of enjoying a good book.

However, the plot sounded amazing for a novel as it is not overdone like many other historical fiction. The characters are well developed as well, from what I can tell. And the ending is a true summary to what happens between the two and their love story.