Estate Planning

The Missing Heir as a Plot Device

By Hull and Hull LLP

Can a work of fiction that serves as a nice diversion from the latest case on the application of the cy-pres doctrine, actually have a plot device that would interest the estates practitioner? 

Stone's Fall is one of those books that, though a massive work of fiction, is a literal page-turner.  It is a mystery/thriller written by Iain Pears who, in 1998, gained huge notoriety for his book "An Instance of the Fingerpost."  The plot is compelling and (like An Instance of the Fingerpost) is told in the first person through multiple characters.  To further complicate things, it unfolds in reverse chronology.  Highly recommended.

Without in any way being a "spoiler", the story opens with a journalist leaving his day job to assist a widow's search for the unidentified child of her deceased husband.  His Will, it seems, identified a very significant sum of money for his unidentified son.  Until this heir is located, the business tycoon's massive estate cannot be distributed. Havoc ensues.

Certainly when I picked up the book, the estates angle was not readily apparent.  That the ascertainment of heirs could be a fundamental plot device in what Malcolm Gladwell called his favourite book of 2009 is more than a little surprising.  However, for a writer of mysteries, the world of estates and trusts can apparently provide ample fodder.  And, by the way, Stone's Fall has an amazing twist that would be a spoiler to disclose! 

David Morgan Smith

Full post as published by Toronto Estate Law Blog on September 17, 2010 (boomark / email).