Before and after Book

Whew! That was a long, hard slog. The story, on the surface, is a fascinating one: What do you, as a parent, do when you suspect - and then find out - that your son has committed murder? Intriguing, right?

Unfortunately, this book manages to make getting to the good stuff - the trial, finding out the truth, the fate of the son - a long and sometimes boring journey. I don't usually take two weeks to read a book, even one that is almost 400 pages. There were many nights when I intended to read longer but Ms. Brown's prose put me to sleep.

The story is told from three points of view: Ben, the father, told in first person; Carolyn, the mother, told in third person; and Judith, the daughter (and sister), also told in third person. I don't object to changing from first to third person if there is a logical reason for it, but I really couldn't see one. The reader does not get to know Ben any better than the other characters, either in the segments he narrates or the ones where we see his actions through the eyes of others.

For that matter, despite the length of the novel and the changing viewpoints, we do not get to know any of the characters very well. The author reveals their actions, but when given the opportunity to reveal their thoughts and motives, generally chooses not to do so. Occasionally, with Ben, we do get motives, but in that case, the author is deliberately evasive about other aspects of the story. For example, we learn why he won't testify against his son, but we do not get to witness the scene in the courtroom where the grand jury is questioning him and we first learn about his feelings regarding the bond between parents and children, something he learned from his father.

We learn that Ben has a temper, and the son, Jacob (the murderer), has an even worse one. Jacob is revealed early on as at least a sociopath and possibly a psychopath. The daughter, Judith, witnesses some of his less savory activities, such as stoning a dog, and Jacob's forcing Judith to manually masturbate him. Later in the novel there are vague mentions of distasteful (and worse) events witnessed by friends and other members of the town, but no specifics are given.

This is what is so frustrating about this book. The reader has to slog through reams and reams of pointless prose which does not advance the story nor reveal anything about the characters that we don't already know, yet there are many key scenes and incidents that the author glosses over without giving any specifics. In fact, the reader does not get to witness the trial at all. Since all the family members were witnesses, they were not allowed in the courtroom unless they were testifying. (I hope Ms. Brown checked the laws for New Hampshire on this issue; in many states, once a witness testifies, he/she can watch the rest of the trial.) The trial was videotaped (the book was written in 1992; digital media was in its infancy) and the family was able to watch the video after it was all over.

The main question the author poses, and it is an interesting one, is whether a parent should lie to protect his/her son from being sent to prison, possibly for life. Jacob admits to the killing, but states he struck the victim only once. Carolyn, a pediatrician, saw the body long before she knew Jacob was a suspect. The victim's head was almost completely bashed in. It is never clear whether Carolyn told Ben the extent of the victim's injuries, but that wouldn't have mattered to Ben. Ben concocts a believable story that gives room for reasonable doubt that Jacob is the killer. Carolyn ultimately refuses to go along with the lie, and in her testimony tells the story as Jacob originally told it.

Naturally this causes tension, not to mention fights, between Ben and Carolyn. And here is another place where the author seems unable or unwilling to reveal the depth of emotion of the characters. Most couples would split over such a radical difference in the way they treat their children. Couples split over differences in their views on spanking, much less testifying in court and possibly condemning your child to a life sentence. Yet this couple stays together, even though it is obvious that after two trials, and two mistrials, Carolyn's feelings toward Jacob are not the same as they were before she discovered the truth about him.

This book was a disappointment. The author had the chance to dig deep and show us how characters in an impossible situation truly feel and react. Instead, this book had all the depth (or lack thereof) of a Lifetime movie. And I wasted two weeks hoping it would finally live up to the promise of its premise. It didn't.