xreactivity

Excellent legal thriller, reminiscent of Presumed Innocent with elements of The Bad Seed. It’s compelling reading from the opening pages, through the trial, to the unexpected conclusion.

What do you do when your child is accused of murder? When you’re not sure he’s telling you the truth? When every new piece of information increases your suspicions and you live in dread of what you might uncover? "Suspicion, once it started to corkscrew into my thoughts, made me experience everything twice: as a questing prosecutor and anxious father, one after the truth, the other terrified of it." Jacob’s parents, Andy and Laurie, are forced to admit they know nothing at all about their son or what he might be capable of. And isn’t that every parent’s worst nightmare?

The only part I didn’t care for was the "murder gene" theory. While I don’t discount biological contributors to behavior, I tend to believe that it is choice in large part that drives a person's actions.