Teaser: 
 He looked off towards the trees. "Do you know what bothers me, Andy? About being here, in this place? It's that for a while-for a few minutes, maybe just a few seconds, I don't know how long-but for some amount of time my son was alive here. He was out there lying in some fucking wet leaves, bleeding to death. And I wasn't here with him. I was supposed to be here to help him.That's what a father does. But I didn't know. I was off somewhere, in the car, in my office, talking on the phone, whatever it was I was doing. Do you understand that, Andy? Do you have any idea how that feels? Can you even imagine it? I saw him get born, I saw him take his first steps and...learn to ride a bike. I took him to his first day of school. But I wasn't here to help him when he died. Can you imagine how that feels?" 
 My Thoughts: 
 I admit, one of the attractions for me about this book was that it's set in Massachusetts, the state I grew up in and currently live in. Sadly, it doesn't have much Massachusetts flavor though I did recognize the place names, and I appreciated that Landay used the local name for one of the state highways and not the official name (You can always tell a tourist or a newbie to the area by what name they call that highway). 
 The book also got off to a slow start. The action starts off quickly enough but the first hundred or so pages are very, very dry, and I kept putting the book down. Then it slowly picked up and I ended staying up all night, until 2:34AM, reading it. Once Landay gets beyond the details of how the DA's office works and begins exploring family dynamics and community dynamics, the story becomes engrossing. (I kept thinking of Jane from Dear Author as I read this, as I know she can be very picky about the accurate portrayal of lawyers and the law. I kept wondering what she'd have to say) It's told entirely from his perspective, so we learn details as he does and follow his thought processes. We feel his pain as he does what he thinks is best to prove Jacob not guilty, and cracks begin emerging in his family. As I read about what his family endured within their town and the way that friends and acquaintances reacted, my heart broke a little. The conclusion of the trial was a bit deus ex machina, and the final ending was both a surprise and yet not. Landay dropped subtle hints throughout the story so that I thought I knew where the story was going but I was only partially right. Despite the slow start, the book was fascinating and engrossing, well worth the read.