False Witness by Karin Slaughter
Synopsis.
AN ORDINARY LIFE
Leigh Coulton has worked hard to build what looks like a normal life. She has a good job as a defence attorney, a daughter doing well in school, and even her divorce is relatively civilised – her life is just as unremarkable as she’d always hoped it would be.
HIDES A DEVASTATING PAST
But Leigh’s ordinary life masks a childhood which was far from average… a childhood tarnished by secrets, broken by betrayal, and finally torn apart by a devastating act of violence.
BUT NOW THE PAST IS CATCHING UP
Then a case lands on her desk – defending a wealthy man accused of rape. It’s the highest profile case she’s ever been given – a case which could transform her career, if she wins. But when she meets the accused, she realises that it’s no coincidence that he’s chosen her as his attorney. She knows him. And he knows her. More to the point, he knows what happened twenty years ago, and why Leigh has spent two decades running.
AND TIME IS RUNNING OUT
If she can’t get him acquitted, she’ll lose much more than the case. The only person who can help her is her younger, estranged sister Calli, the last person Leigh would ever want to ask for help. But suddenly she has no choice…
The Review
Have you ever wondered what the characters in ALL THE UGLY AND WONDERFUL THINGS are up to? They’re starring in Karin Slaughter’s latest standalone thriller, FALSE WITNESS. No, but seriously, it’s eerily similar.
Reading it felt a little like déjà vu. It’s set during Covid times, mid-lockdown, or, I guess, in between.
If that doesn’t trigger you enough, there’s plenty of other triggers to go around, including rape, PTSD, drug abuse, violence, trauma, and so on.
But what else is new with Karin?
Not much….
This book stars sisters. (Karin loves female duo dynamics). Passages are as traumatic as her characters’ lives. The whole time reading it, I felt like I was reading trauma porn, holding my breath. Only pausing to pray for everyone in the book.
So why I do sign up again and again for this kind of torture?
Why am I a Karin Slaughter fan?
As far as “psychological thrillers” go, Karin Slaughters are towards the top.
She has done just enough research to make the plot believable and has an expert hand with a dictionary, proficiently using her words to carve out whatever is left of your reader’s soul.
Her characters walk out of the DSM-5, fully formed, like scarecrows. Haunting my every waking hour.
Do you want to know what boundaries look like to an addict?
Read this book…
Do you want to know why a person holds onto their secrets beyond the point of absolution?
Read this book…
And come back here and tell me why humans are scarier than demons on any given day.
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