After stumbling upon a chilling small-town secret in South Carolina, a determined public defender must protect herself -- and her young son -- from those who want them dead.
Kendall Deaton pulls herself and her baby out of a wrecked car, and a mixture of courage and fear gets her to the top of a ravine, where she flags down help. But she doesn't dare reveal her true identity to the authorities. Instead, she plans her immediate escape, and her perilous flight begins.
Kendall, the best public defender in Prosper, South Carolina, has stumbled upon a chilling town secret, turning her marriage to one of Prosper's most powerful men into a living hell. Now Kendall is a terrified mother trying to save her child's life, a reluctant witness who knows too much about an insidious evil . . . and a woman surrounded by forces that will stop at nothing to protect what is "theirs." ( )

Thriller

A good, quick summer mystery! ( )

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Public defender, Kendall Deaton, is happy in her marriage to Matt Burnwood even though she doesn't really like the amount of time he spends with his father or their love for hunting. She overlooks those things until she takes the case of a local woman accused of killing her husband. Kendall wants to use the fact that the woman was being abused as part of her defense, but she is appalled by her husband and father-in-law's attitude, making her realize that she may have made a mistake in marrying Matt.

The first half of The Witness follows different timelines and characters requiring the reader to pay close attention to the story, but also creating layers to add enjoyment of the plot. However, the latter half of the story is over-the-top crazy, with several one dimensional characters that have questionable motivation for their actions. Also, some of the language use is very uncomfortable. There is enough left, though, to keep the reader interested and there is an unexpected twist near the end of the story that ties up some of the loose ends. Overall, The Witness has a great setup, but the execution of the latter half of the story is unimpressive. ( )