For such a hotshot lawyer who’s never lost a court case, you’re a lot younger than anyone would expect. And it’s your win/loss record, not your good looks, that’s wooed Rob Jacobson—publishing and real estate heir—to hire you. He’s accused of killing three and needs you to get him off on a murder charge. 

This is the biggest murder trial of your life—which you’ve just discovered will be very short—not the trial—your life. You just came from the doctor’s and gotten the grim diagnosis—12 months to live. 

How do you address life with so little of it left for you? A court case? Really? Why bother? Your client toys with you, undermining your legal strategy to keep him out of New York City’s infamous Riker’s Island. What does he know that you don’t? He claims he didn’t do it. He repeats that over and over. You don’t believe him, but it’s still your job to see him walk out of that courtroom a free man.

Now, the trial has started, and things begin to go wrong immediately. You don’t like your client who repeatedly keeps important information about his case—your case—from you. How can you do your best under these circumstances? And in your condition, does this matter anymore? And one more thought, is he the one trying to kill you? 

Talk about attorney-client privilege! Jane Smith, how do you cope?

12 Months to Live is the latest James Patterson novel co-written with Mike Lupica. The world’s most prolific novelist, and the famed New York sportswriter, columnist, commentator, and author—are teaming up for the third time to wrap a novel around one of Patterson’s inventive plots.

By combining their talents, they’ve created a doozy launching September 25 about a tough woman who struggles to face her fast-approaching mortality. “She really believes if she stops working, she’ll be waiting to die,” Lupica says. The authors pride themselves on writing strong female characters, and they’ve succeeded in 12 Months to Live.

 To say the least, not all of the action is in the courtroom. People are getting shot up, beat up, and they end up dead in the true James Patterson style. And it’s all about the woman—Jane Smith—with the plain-Jane name, who’s going to die in twelve months. Actually, she negotiates it up to fourteen—her way of coping—which says so much about her.

But why the plain-Jane name, Jane Smith? (Try saying that three times quickly.) Asking that question is like bellying up to a bar with Patterson and Lupica—which is where they actually met years ago—and where the banter and laughs are non-stop, and the quips fly faster than one of Patterson’s chapters.

“We met in a bar, and I’m proud to say it.” Lupica actually does. “We just hit it off. It’s amazing it took us as long as it did to write together.” This is their third novel together. They’ve known each other long enough to finish each other’s sentences, if not beers.

So back to the question. Why plain-Jane Smith?

Says Lupica, “Jane ‘Effing’ Smith just seemed like a tough New York City-raised working woman.”

“It worked well with ‘Effing,’” says Patterson, stretching a long grin across his face. “But I chickened out…We would have lost a few readers with that one.”

“They’re going to effing love Jane Effing Smith,” Lupica backhands. His volley clears the net in their game of Can You Top This? “We thought literature needed a new Great Jane—like Jane Austen and Jane Eyre.” 

If only they really were in a bar at the moment instead of sitting at their desks for an interview. Which leaves us with plain-Jane and the reason Patterson quickly turns serious. Part of the Jane character is based on Patterson’s personal life. His early love, Jane Blanchard, died young after battling a brain tumor. While her ordeal did not inspire this novel, it did help Patterson understand his protagonist in 12 Months to Live, who also suffers from a brain tumor.

“She wasn’t as tough as Jane is,” Patterson says of his late significant other. “She just never wanted to bring people down. In the hospital she had a different funny hat every day (to cover the effects of chemo.)”

12 Months to Live is the first of three novels planned for this character before she finally meets her final judgment. It’s not giving anything away that she survives the first book in this trilogy since, well, she’s got to survive at least the next one. The idea to stretch her story over three novels is pure Patterson, the risk taker. Always trying something new, he doesn’t want anyone telling him what he can and cannot do, and he’s earned a position in the literary world to enjoy that privilege. 

Depending on how well the three books go, could Jane’s coping mechanism work and she survive her haggled mental dictate of two extra months (or maybe longer)? Patterson tips his head slyly and says his goal is to entertain.

The film rights have already been sold and a “big-time actress” badly wants the role, Patterson says. A writer from the TV series “Ozark” has agreed to pen the screenplay. 

Book two (8 Months to Live?) is now in the editing process and they are ten chapters into book three (4 Months to Live?). Whether we get 3 Months and 30 Days to Live will depend solely on the popularity of the series. While Patterson has no intention of going beyond three books, if his character catches on, well, who knows what he might do? The only assured thing is he isn’t talking.

During the writing of this novel, the co-authors did talk to each other four or five times a day about their ideas. Typically, Lupica would sound off with a concept, and Patterson, the man of 1,000 plots who never suffers writers block, would build on the idea until they agreed to it.

“We’re in synch the way we look at the world,” Patterson says.

“Most writers would rather go to dentist than write,” Lapica adds.

“We both love to write,” says Patterson. “We have a stupid amount of fun.”

During our conversation, he looks at Lupica with a straight face: “I had no bad reviews until I started writing with cowriters.” They both laugh. Their friendship is real. Their enjoyment of the writing process is obvious. And the quips and the laughter? It’s as if their lives depended on it.

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