From the Book cover:
In nineteen minutes, you can mow the front lawn, color your hair, watch a
third of a hockey game. In nineteen minutes, you can bake scones or get
a tooth filled by a dentist; you can fold laundry for a family of
five....In nineteen minutes, you can stop the world, or you can just
jump off it. In nineteen minutes, you can get revenge.
Sterling is a small, ordinary New Hampshire town where nothing ever
happens -- until the day its complacency is shattered by a shocking act
of violence. In the aftermath, the town's residents must not only seek
justice in order to begin healing but also come to terms with the role
they played in the tragedy. For them, the lines between truth and
fiction, right and wrong, insider and outsider have been obscured
forever. Josie Cormier, the teenage daughter of the judge sitting on the
case, could be the state's best witness, but she can't remember what
happened in front of her own eyes. And as the trial progresses, fault
lines between the high school and the adult community begin to show,
destroying the closest of friendships and families.
