In a weedy clearing on the outskirts of Memphis, two boys watch a shiny Lincoln pull up. Eleven-year-old Mark Sway and his younger brother are sharing a forbidden cigarette when a chance encounter with the suicidal lawyer Jerome Clifford. driver of the Lincoln. The man, under the influence of drugs and alcohol, reveals to Mark that he is about to kill himself to avoid being murdered by Barry "The Blade" Muldanno, who has hidden the body of Senator Boyd Boyette after murdering him. Mark's possession of the bloody and explosive secret--the whereabouts of the most sought-after dead body in America--wreaks havoc on his family. Mark becomes caught between a legal system gone mad and a mob killer desperate to cover up his crime. His only ally is a woman named Reggie Love, who has been a lawyer for all of four years. Prosecutors are willing to break all the rules to make Mark talk. The mob will stop at nothing to keep him quiet. And Reggie will do anything to protect her client--even take a last, desperate gamble that could win Mark his freedom or cost them both their lives.
A 1994 film based on the novel was directed by Joel Schumacher and starred Susan Sarandon, Tommy Lee Jones, Mary-Louise Parker, and newcomer Brad Renfro. The film was released on July 20, 1994. For her work in the film, Susan Sarandon was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress and won a BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role, and Renfro won for a Young Star Awards and Young Artist Award. The film was so successful that it spawned a television series of the same name, starring JoBeth Williams and John Heard. It ran for one season, 1995–1996.
A highly collectible, signed book by one of America's best-known writers of legal thrillers!