Silent Son

by Gallatin Warfield

Book Overview

When the young son of prosecutor Gardner Lawson is the only witness to the senseless shooting of two elderly shopkeepers--and blocks out the memory--Lawson is torn between his desire for justice and... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0446517259
• ISBN13: 9780446517256
• Release Date: January 1994
• Publisher: Warner Books (NY)
• Length: 328 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

An exceptional gem

A very fine story, very gripping, well conceived and with a neat prose. Every step of the way, the author employs unique narrative skills and concludes with a mesmerizing unexpected superb ending...How lucky I was to find this book....

A powerful narrative and very moving story

Henry and Addie Bowers had a country store in western Maryland where they dispensed candy for the children, kept a petting zoo in the back, and chairs around a wood-burning stove where friends and customers could gather, relax and swap stories. Everybody loved Henry and Addie -- except whoever killed them. Nothing was taken from the store. It didn't appear to be a robbery. Rather, it looked like an execution. But who would execute this gentle, elderly couple? Other than the killers themselves, only one person knows -- and he can't tell. Eight-year-old Granville, son of State's Attorney Gardner Lawson, is the first one off the bus when his class, on an outing from school, stops at the store for cold drinks and snacks and a chance to pet the animals. He is first to burst into the store to see his beloved Henry and Addie, only to find them on the floor covered in blood with two men with guns standing over them. Left severely traumatized with the imprint of a gun on his forehead, Granville's memory of what he witnessed is quickly and deeply buried, to surface only in nightmares and a strange emblem he draws over and over. When Sgt. Joe Brown (Brownie) arrests two men for the grisly crime, Gardner is certain the men are guilty but his case against them is weak. Unless Granville can remember what he saw, and testify to it in court, it is unlikely that the state can win a conviction. Thus the state's attorney is thrust into a terrible conflict, caught between the need to convict the killers and the need to protect his young son. He is warned that, if pushed too hard, the child might be damaged for life. But, with two killers out on bond and bent on eliminating the only eye witness, unless Granville can remember, he may not have a life! So, while Gardner is immobilzed by the struggle to help his son, and the conflict with Carole, his son's mom, his case is carried on by Jennifer Fahrnam, his assistant attorney and live-in lover. And Brownie continues digging for evidence, an exercise that carries him down twisting paths of hidden money and an incredible secret that has been deeply buried for two generations.Silent Son is people with characters we met in State V. Justice and hoped to see more of. It is a powerfully written novel in which the surprises keep coming to the very last page, and a deeply moving story that catapults Warfield to the top of the list of lawyerly-writers.