Defending Jacob
Includes exclusive new material to tie into the Apple TV series
-
-
4.0 • 57 Ratings
-
-
- $12.99
Publisher Description
NOW A MAJOR TV SERIES - FEATURING EXCLUSIVE NEW MATERIAL FROM THE AUTHOR.
If your son was on trial for murder, what would you do?
Andy Barber's job is to put killers behind bars. And when a boy from his son Jacob's school is found stabbed to death, Andy is doubly determined to find and prosecute the perpetrator.
Until a crucial piece of evidence turns up linking Jacob to the murder. And suddenly Andy and his wife find their son accused of being a cold-blooded killer.
In the face of every parent's worst nightmare, they will do anything to defend their child. Because, deep down, they know him better than anyone.
Don't they?
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Discovering that your child has been killed is any parent’s worst nightmare—but discovering your child has been accused of murder would be its own special hell. With Defending Jacob, William Landay plays on both of these fears. His riveting legal thriller centres on prosecutor Andy Barber, who’s investigating the brutal stabbing death of a teenage boy named Ben Rifkin when the probe takes an unexpected turn—straight into the Barber family home. Once Andy’s 14-year-old son Jacob becomes the prime suspect in the shocking crime, we experience a real sense of terror right alongside his father. The visceral emotion of Andy’s first-person narration adds layers of complexity to the mystery. This thought-provoking drama—the inspiration for an Apple TV+ show—left us wondering, “What would I do?”
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Andy Barber, a respected First Assistant DA who lives in Newton, Mass., with his gentle wife, Laurie, and their 14-year-old son, Jacob, must face the unthinkable in Dagger Award winner Landay's harrowing third suspense novel. When Ben Rifkin, Jacob's classmate, is found stabbed to death in the woods, Internet accusations and incontrovertible evidence point to big, handsome Jacob. Andy's prosecutorial gut insists a child molester is the real killer, but as Jacob's trial proceeds and Andy's marriage crumbles under the forced revelation of old secrets, horror builds on horror toward a breathtakingly brutal outcome. Landay (The Strangler), a former DA, mixes gritty court reporting with Andy's painful confrontation with himself, forcing readers willy-nilly to realize the end is never the end when, as Landay claims, the line between truth and justice has become so indistinct as to appear imaginary. This searing narrative proves the ancient Greek tragedians were right: the worst punishment is not death but living with what you knowingly or unknowingly have done. Author tour.
