False Witness by Karin Slaughter

There have been some really great books published this year. Then Karin Slaughter comes out and resets the bar with False Witness.

Leigh Collier clawed her way out of her troubled upbringing to graduate from a top law school and work at a prestigious Atlanta law firm. She has a sixteen-year-old daughter that she adores and a husband she loves even after their separation. This life she has built is threatened when she is called in on a Sunday night by a partner in her firm to represent Andrew Tenant, who has been accused of a violent rape and has just fired his attorney on the eve of trial. She can’t understand why he has requested her to represent him until she meets him and realizes how she and her younger sister are connected to him. Now secrets she thought were buried 23 years ago are threatening to come to light. Leigh is forced to turn for help to her younger sister who she hasn’t seen in years.

Leigh frantically searches for a way out of the mess, but at each step the danger becomes greater and a solution further out of reach. Younger sister Callie faces her own demons and knows that finding a way out for her and Leigh is the only thing that matters.

The plot moves relentlessly forward as you get to know more and more about the characters and feel for them each time a new development drops on them like an anvil.

Slaughter pulls you in so firmly that when she drops a bombshell you are literally stunned. She carefully plants the breadcrumbs that lead to an explosive revelation that bursts in your mind and you are instantly able to trace back all the signs that pointed to this outcome in a moment of perfect clarity.

Slaughter writes in a way that is akin to virtual reality. You see through her characters’ eyes, feel what they are feeling and fear what they fear. She doesn’t shy away from describing the evil that people do to one another, particularly to women, and the ways that they often get away with it. Her plotting is outstanding and keeps you racing forward as you hope for the best and fear the worst.

Every year that Slaughter has a book come out, the race is for second place. She’s simply the best.

I was provided a copy of this book by the publisher.