The Laws of Our Fathers

by Scott Turow

Overview

In Kindle County, a woman is killed in an apparent random drive-by shooting. The woman turns out to be the ex-wife of a prominent state senator and an old acquaintance of Judge Sonia Klonsky, on whose desk the case lands. As the pursuit of justice takes bizarre and unusual turns, Judge Klonsky is brought face-to-face with a host of extraordinary personalities and formidable enemies bent on her destruction.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780446574945
Publisher:	Grand Central Publishing
Publication date:	04/05/2011
Pages:	752
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 7.80(h) x 1.60(d)

About the Author

Scott Turow is the author of many bestselling works of fiction, including Testimony, Identical, Innocent, Presumed Innocent, and The Burden of Proof, and two nonfiction books, including One L, about his experience as a law student. His books have been translated into more than forty languages, sold more than thirty million copies worldwide, and have been adapted into movies and television projects. He has frequently contributed essays and op-ed pieces to publications such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, and The Atlantic.

Hometown:

Chicago, Illinois

Date of Birth:

April 12, 1949

Place of Birth:

Chicago, Illinois

Education:

B.A. in English, Amherst College, 1970; M.A., Stanford University, 1974; J.D., Harvard University, 1978

Website:

http://www.scottturow.com/

Editorial Reviews

The undisputed king of contemporary legal intrigue (Pleading Guilty, 1993, etc.) offers a sumptuous triple-decker tracing the tangled roots of an apparently accidental murder back 25 years.

The present-day story begins with the death of inoffensive June Eddgar, victim of a daybreak drive-by shooting. Investigating officers, who waste no time turning eyewitness Ordell Trent, a.k.a. Hardcore, figure the dead woman, who'd been driving a car belonging to her husband, State Senator Loyell Eddgar, was killed in error for him, and on the orders of Eddgar's son Nile, Hardcore's probation officer, whose reasons for ordering his father's execution Kindle County prosecutors are only too eager to unfold to Judge Sonia Klonsky. But Sonny Klonsky brings her own baggage to the case. Back in her college days, her political convictions and her hell-raising social life had brought her together with June Eddgar, unofficial den mother to campus radicals; Nile's baby-sitter Seth Weissman, who shared Sonny's bed and board; and Hobie Tuttle, the D.C. lawyer who's now defending Nile. As the case against Nile lurches forward—replete with all the courtroom razzle-dazzle you'd expect from Turow, and the revelations of character and milieu you wouldn't expect from anyone else—Sonny's voice increasingly yields to Seth's. Determined to avoid the draft by fleeing to Canada, and devoutly (if symbolically) attached to the cause of Cleveland Marsh, a jailed Black Panther whose bail he wishes he could post, he plots to combine his two goals by faking his own kidnapping—a plot that spirals out of control with fatal consequences for himself, his parents, and, yes, the Eddgar family.

Beneath the layers of deep legal deviousness, Turow never lets you forget that his characters lived and loved before they ever got dragged into court, and that they have lives to go back to after the final gavel comes down.

Kirkus Reviews

Spectacularly worth the wait... Turow's grasp of the revolutionary fervor of the '60s and how it has later calmed into rueful, if still compassionate, acceptance, is masterly.” —Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)

“The undisputed king of contemporary legal intrigue ... offers a sumptuous triple-decker.” —Kirkus Reviews (Starred Review)

“Turow's most ambitious novel yet.” —The New York Times

From the Publisher