Publication Date January 24, 2025
I’ve been a big fan of Scott Turow since I read Presumed Innocent back in the 1980s when I was working in a public library. How much do I love him? I read tons of mysteries/thrillers, and am particularly fond of legal intrigue in that category. But I will drop EVERYTHING on my TBR list when a new book by Scott Turow is released! So when I had the opportunity to read an advance copy of Presumed Guilty (release date January 4, 2025) from Grand Central Publishing and NetGalley, I once again shut off the world for a few days! (Turow’s books are definitely not in my “one night stand” category!)
His first novel, Presumed Innocent, came out in 1986, and introduced characters in the fictional Kindle County (cough Chicago/Cook County cough) – several of whom reappear in later books in the Kindle County series. Presumed Innocent set the tone with prosecutor “Rusty” Sabich and defense attorney Alejandro “Sandy” Stern. In Presumed Guilty, Sabich is now retired after both spending time in prison, then serving as a judge. He has left Kindle County and is living on a lake in a quiet part of the rural midwest, planning a wedding with Bea. Rusty admits he didn’t exactly plan their situation: “I am not certain that we would have ended up under the same roof if Covid had not forced our hands.” They find their idyllic haven further disrupted by Bea’s adult son Aaron, adopted at birth. Bea is white, Aaron is black – not that it should matter, but it definitely does in this story. Rusty is generous, supportive, and loving to Bea as she struggles with Aaron’s issues, and he admits to being “impressed by the occasional cruelty of motherhood with its consuming anxieties that seem to have no expiration date.”
Aaron disappears while staying with Rusty and Bea while on probation for drug possession. Worried about him being sent back to jail, Rusty and Bea begin a somewhat frantic search for Aaron, starting with his Grandfather (with whom he has a close relationship). Rusty hasn’t been overly involved in the somewhat touchy relationship between Bea and her father: “Bea’s grievance with her father is akin to a spring with an underground source: it will never run dry.” After Aaron returns, he is charged with murder, and needs an attorney. Bea suggests Rusty and, after he asserts he isn’t qualified, Bea points out “Do you know what qualification you do have? You understand what it’s like to be charged with a murder you didn’t commit.” What could possibly go wrong? As the trial goes along, things get complicated and Rusty realizes “...she is putting saving Aaron ahead of her relationship with me.”
As things go on, many of Rusty’s relationships and ideas are tested. His great friend Mansy tells Rusty that he is destroying the lives of several people: “There’s wreckage everywhere you’ve gone.” Rusty’s response is to tell Mansy that it’s “ …called the criminal justice system… It’s a slaughterhouse and just about everyone who gets close up ends up spattered with blood. People think it’s so great to punish bad guys until they get caught up in the grisly business of doing it.”
I loved it. Since I can’t give this SIX stars, I’ll go with five. Thank you, Scott Turow!