Archivist Beecher White discovers a connection that may link the individuals responsible for the only four successful assassinations of American Presidents after discovering a modern-day killer who is recreating the assassins' crimes.

John Grisham returns to Clanton, Mississippi, to tell the story of an unthinkable murder, the bizarre trial that follows it, and its profound and lasting effect on the people of Ford County. Pete Banning was Clanton's favorite son, a returning war hero, the patriarch of a prominent family, a farmer, father, neighbor, and a faithful member of the Methodist church. Then one cool October morning in 1946, he rose early, drove into town, walked into the...