Content Warning: This section refers to alcohol use disorder, murder, stalking, and psychological manipulation.

“Keera had deliberately misquoted Walsh. ‘Complete, accurate, and truthful,’ she repeated, for the jury’s benefit. Each question was strategic. Keera thought several questions ahead, choosing the next one depending on Walsh’s answer.”

In the opening scene, Dugoni gives an early example of Keera’s courtroom strategy. Keera thinks several steps ahead, modifying her strategy with each new piece of information. Throughout the novel, this ability to use Chess Strategy in Law and Life will be one of her greatest strengths, and her ability to adapt and modify strategy is a part of that.

“The family legal mantle had fallen to Ella, child number three, and it had been a heavy load. Ella was part lawyer, part caretaker, a task she shared with daughter number two, Margaret. Keera had been unexpected, born ten years after Maggie. With an infant at home, their mother could no longer function as Patsy’s caretaker. Ella and Maggie filled that role.”

This passage offers early insight into the dynamics of the Duggan family. It illustrates how Patsy’s alcohol use shapes the family, driving their behaviors and, in many ways, defining their characters. The lack of boundaries between the family and the firm that is shown in the passage reflects the way the family brings the personal into the professional.

“‘Maybe you could spend the night. We could play chess by the fireplace. Like old times.’

‘It’s ninety degrees out, Dad.’

‘So, we won’t light a fire.’

‘We’ll see,’ she said, because it was easier than saying no.”

At the beginning of the novel, Patsy attempts to reconnect with Keera through their shared love of chess, which has always bonded them, but Keera maintains her distance. Her experiences as the child of someone who misuses alcohol have resulted in a lack of trust and a desire to maintain a “safe” distance. Throughout the novel, Keera’s relationship with Patsy will shift, and they will reconnect through both working the case together and playing chess online.