after reading "The Bridge" I was anxious to read this one. Too bad this author only wrote two books before his death. I liked this one as much as the first. It is a little confusing at times when he moves between the 1990's and 1964 -- the chapter titles don't clarify that for you. But if you can get past that, the story line is very very good. Love story, court drama, civil rights history all wrapped into one. An excellent era.
Born and raised in Mississippi, Carter Ransom came to New York as a young man and has risen to become a columnist with a major city newspaper. But when his life in New York falls apart and he heads back home to recover, the still-live conflicts of his youth in the civil rights era rise up all around him again. A twenty-five-year-old murder case has just been reopened, a church bombing that killed Carter's first love. Carter's father was the judge in the case, and now there's evidence that the trial was flawed, even fixed, and the case's reopening threatens the foundation of Carter's identity, as well as his relationship to his family.