Defending Jacob: A Novel

I began this novel by listening to it on CD and was mesmerized by the narration performance of Grover Gardner who made an excellent Andy Barber, the assistant district attorney whose 14-year-old son Jacob was indicted for murder of a fellow student at McCormick Middle School. I totally identified with Andy's indignation and disbelief at the turn of events in this story. His anguish was palpable and believable.

While I was listening to this book, my husband had simultaneously been reading the hard copy. It was a race for both of us to finish, but I won simply because I found the novel so engaging that, by the time I had gotten to its midpoint, I literally could not put it down.

In addition, I could not believe how engrossed I became in show more the courtroom testimony as well as the questions of prosecuting attorney Neal Legiudice and defense attorney Jonathan Klein. That is so unlike me. As a parent, I totally felt what Andy Barber was feeling. Throughout most of this book, I really had no idea if Jacob was guilty or innocent. I did not guess the story's trajectory, another factor which made reading it fun. If more "legal thrillers" were as interesting as this novel, I might even become a fan of this genre one day.

My only tiniest criticism of this book is that it seemed as if it had four distinct endings. Let me explain. The crescendo of the story ended and the result of the court case was revealed. Ending one. Then another short story ensued. Ending two. Then there was a peaceful lull. Ending three. Then there was a crisis. Ending four. The last three endings seemed tacked on. I liked the first ending (which wasn't the ending at all) the best. I loved the experience of reading this story and look forward to reading other works by this new-to-me author. show less

Defending Jacob starts with an all too terrible crime—the murder of a child. But next comes the question of a child wrongly accused, a criminal investigation sidetracked by the desire for immediate results and the politics of position, and a parent facing a very different loss of his beloved son. The parent in question is an assistant district attorney, and the son is an awkward teenager with few friends at school and a complex life online. The resulting novel is a fascinating exploration of relationships, the legal system, suspicion and society.

From the start, Jacob’s case will be fraught with trouble. A professional belief in the justice system can’t overwhelm a professional knowledge of its failures. A personal love for family show more can’t stop the cracks created by personal flaws. And the revelations of history can’t define the future. But if the law can’t be relied on, and science is suspect, who will decide the future for the child?

Author William Landay leads his readers through webs of mystery, inviting and exploring fascinating questions about the place of genetics, computer games and bullying in childhood violence. I enjoyed the slow reveal of details and suspicions, and the fact that the author never made me privy to things not yet known. The story’s a haunting one on so many levels, vividly real, tragically believable, and very cleverly balanced on the pinhead of guilt. What makes us angry? What keeps us sane? And what, in the end, defines a boy’s innocence?

Disclosure: A friend loaned me a copy and I’m really glad she did. Thank you. show less

Andy Barber is the chief ADA in a small town when one of the students at his son's school is found knifed to death. When his son is charged with the murder, his world is upended.

Andy makes every effort to protect his son. He knows the system and that’s what scares him. “You imagine the courts are reliable, that wrong results are rare, and therefore I ought to have trusted the system.. . Here’s the dirty little secret: The error rate in criminal verdicts is much higher than anyone imagines. Not just false negatives, the guilty criminals who get off scot-free–those errors we recognize and accept…The real surprise is the frequency of false positives, the innocent men found guilty. . .Our blind trust in the system is the show more product of ignorance and magical thinking, and there was no way I was going to trust my son’s fate to it. Not because I believed he was guilty, I assure you, but precisely because he was innocent.”

And there’s a long history of violence in Andy’s family. The pressures on the family mount as *all* of their relationships bend and many break under the strain of the accusation. Andy's father is in prison for murder. Is there such a thing as a "violence gene"?

Landay has written a very compelling story, nicely integrating current technology and how kids use it, that plays on every parents' fears. Just how well do we know out children? You get a real sense of the pressure on the family, the ostracizing by the community, and the doubt that creeps into the minds of the parents.

First rate. Great book for a discussion group of nature/nurture, parental responsibility, child relationships, the legal system, a host of things. show less

I really enjoyed this, although the only character I could really empathize with was the mother. Honestly for nearly the entire book I wished I could smack the main character, with his willful obtuseness and irritating arrogance. I felt, in his own way, that he's as much a sociopath as any of his progenitors that he's so horrified and ashamed of. I don't feel his steadfast support of his son was really a reflection of his love for him, but more about his own self-image. Likewise, he doesn't seem to have any real feelings for his wife. Whenever he speaks of her, it's all about what she does or has done for him. He's certainly only concerned for her in the most superficial way, although he excuses that to himself as prioritizing his son's show more needs first.

I had, of course, guessed the surprise twist at the end, fairly early in the book. It would have been hard not to, with all the broad hints. But I couldn't guess the circumstances or how it happened, and the story was compelling enough to keep me reading through to the end. I wanted to find out how it all turned out. It was definitely worth the read.

This was the Audible version, read by Grover Gardner, who did an excellent job as usual. show less

As with "The Round House: A Novel" by Louise Erdrich, "Defending Jacob" by William Landay is not ordinarily a novel that I would select on my own to read. However, it was a selection choice for me as part of LibraryThing's Secret Santa 2014. I am glad that the novel was brought to my attention.

Written by a former assistant district attorney before turning to writing novels, there is a particular authenticity that is fundamental to the depth of this novel. I believe to give this book a label (e.g. legal thriller) would also be an injustice to the depth of the experience in reading this work.

Perhaps it can all best be explained by the author himself. There is a section in the edition that I read entitled, "A Conversation with William show more Landay." One of the interviewer's questions is "Does plot come first for you, or character?" The author explains, "They come at the same time." He then goes on to share, "One of the pitfalls of dividing our books into genre novels versus 'literary' novels is that we have come to expect too little character out of the first and too little plot out of the second, leaving both poorer. A good novel needs both, of course, and the two should be wrapped as tight as the strands in a rope."

This novel is without a doubt "wrapped as tight as the strands in a rope." It is the best example of a literary novel that I can think of since reading "The Orchardist" by Amanda Coplin. The novel draws the reader into the lives of one family - Andy, Laurie, and Jacob Barber. The reader will be engrossed into the wide scope of relationships that compose all of their lives from the immediate to extended family relationships, adult friendships, teenage friendships, and dynamics with coworkers to mention a few. The reader will become enmeshed through the emotions as shared steadily through the eyes of the father Andy Barber but not merely as father to Jacob, husband to Laurie, but also as a son, as a man who has an unwavering belief in justice, an wavering love of his child. Within the strands of the rope, within the core of the novel, it presents a question: How far would you go to protect your child? A parent might think they know the answer to this simple question but is it a simple question? How far would you go? It is a dramatic story that is timeless in presentation and I believe will be held as a classic in the years to come.

It is a thoughtful composition that sheds light into areas where many of us are not familiar from family meetings with a criminal defense attorney to the stark spotlight of courtroom procedure to the letter of the law* to the periods of waiting between crime to investigation to trial, and the periods of waiting between the close of court session for the day and the continuation of court session on the following day through the course of a trial.

This is a book not easily picked up to read by all readers but for those readers that enter between the covers of the hardback or paperback or begin clicking the pages on their eReader (e.g. Kindle, Nook), it is an incomparable, thought-provoking experience.

*Definition of "Letter of the Law" as provided by "Black's Law Dictionary Free Online Legal Dictionary", 2nd Ed. "The strict and exact force of the language used in a statute, as distinguished from the spirit, general purpose, and policy of the statute." show less

A very well-done family drama in the guise of a legal thriller. Or maybe vice versa? Either way, this story of a prosecuting attorney forced off a case when his son is arrested for the crime raises a lot of uncomfortable questions and doesn't even try to answer them all. I found the narrative compelling and the characters believable and well-developed. And while I was somewhat prepared for the first "twist" at the end, the second took me completely by surprise and left me stunned and my eyes tear-filled. Even if you don't think this is your type of book, give it a shot. You might be surprised.

A terrific, well-written book about what happens to a family when a modern tragedy occurs. In this case, it is not that their child or family member dies; the tragedy is that a young boy in their son's grade and school is killed, and their son is accused of the murder.

Since the dad, Andy, works in the DA's office (First DA is his official title), theirs is a unique view of the case and the trial. Andy wants to take the case initially since he usually takes the high profile ones. That situation remains until his son is charged with the murder, and little by little the stiff neck that Andy shows goes into the sand. He argues as the narrator that Jacob is his son and any parent would try to save him; his wife, Laurie, does her best to keep show more normalcy in the family as she slowly falls apart with the magnitude of this tragedy.

There are also secrets and science and for the first time Andy has to accept that he has to hire a defense lawyer. Jacob comes across as a normal, 14-year-old boy, but then there is the family time and discussions in the defense-appointed psychologist's office and more great (tragic) moments arrive.

It is so hard to review this book without giving anything away! I was ready to try to pull Andy's stiff neck out of the sand, but then Chapter 19 happened and the support of friends on a group was strong and I stuck with the book till the end. OMG! What an end. But the strength of this book is its twists and turns and hard looks at the character, and the stiff neck of the narrator. The fact that I had, um, issues with him points to a writer who understands his characters and that they are human. And humans have flaws. And to see oneself in them, or to see them for stiff-necked humans, is part of the brilliance of this novel.

Hint: it's hard to put down. Other books when on the "hold" pile while this book sucked me in. show less