Editorial Content for Saving Emma
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An attorney is faced with both the case of a lifetime and a family crisis that threatens to tear his life apart in SAVING EMMA. Allen Eskens has always been a great thriller writer with a bent towards literary fiction, and those talents are on full display here.
Boady Sanden is a law professor who works for the Innocence Project, an organization devoted to looking at previously tried cases in which the convicted person may indeed be innocent. One day, a strange woman named Ruth Matthews darkens his doorway. She discusses the plight of her brother, Elijah, who was accused of murdering Jalen Bale, the pastor from his church. He was found not guilty by reason of insanity and was placed in psychiatric care instead of prison. Elijah considers himself a prophet with a direct line to God. Ruth believes this and feels that it is God’s will for Boady to step in to prove his innocence.
"SAVING EMMA is a great book that pulls no punches and shows off Eskens’ ability to toe that line between literary fiction and page-turning thriller."
When Boady looks up the original case, he learns something startling. Elijah’s attorney was the late Ben Pruitt, a one-time best friend of Boady’s who took his own life in Boady’s home. With Pruitt’s wife also gone, their young daughter Emma was immediately made an orphan. Boady and his wife, Dee, chose to take her in as their ward, which made sense as Boady was her Christian godfather.
The connection between the two situations is a dynamic one, made that much more fiery when the now-teenage Emma’s Aunt Anna --- an extremely wealthy and driven woman --- steps in and takes Emma from Boady and Dee without notice. Boady is now an attorney with the Elijah case and the client of a former student of his who specializes in custody cases like the one involving Emma. The bottom line is that he will forego his commitments to the Innocence Project if it means he can bring Emma back safe and sound.
Throughout this ordeal, Boady also must face the wrath of his wife. Dee, who cannot conceive after several miscarriages, feels that he helped push Emma away from them by treating her as a ward of their home and not a member of the family. You can imagine the inner turmoil that Boady must be going through as he is caught between this rock and a hard place. Eskens wrings out this turmoil for all that it’s worth.
Boady begins to have some success with the Elijah case, which includes a possible alibi putting him far away from the time and place of the murder. On the other hand, the Emma case becomes much more complicated than he ever expected as Anna has both deep pockets and no soul.
SAVING EMMA is a great book that pulls no punches and shows off Eskens’ ability to toe that line between literary fiction and page-turning thriller.
Teaser
When Boady Sanden first receives the case of Elijah Matthews, he’s certain there’s not much he can do. Elijah, who believes himself to be a prophet, has been locked up in a psychiatric hospital for the past four years, convicted of brutally murdering the pastor of a megachurch. But as a law professor working for the Innocence Project, Boady agrees to look into Elijah’s file. When he does, he is alarmed to find threads that lead back to the death of his colleague and friend, Ben Pruitt, a man shot to death four years earlier in Boady’s own home. Ben’s daughter, Emma, has lived with Boady and Boady’s wife, Dee, ever since that awful night. Now 14 years old, Emma has been growing distant and soon makes a fateful choice that takes her far from the safety of her godparents.
Promo
When Boady Sanden first receives the case of Elijah Matthews, he’s certain there’s not much he can do. Elijah, who believes himself to be a prophet, has been locked up in a psychiatric hospital for the past four years, convicted of brutally murdering the pastor of a megachurch. But as a law professor working for the Innocence Project, Boady agrees to look into Elijah’s file. When he does, he is alarmed to find threads that lead back to the death of his colleague and friend, Ben Pruitt, a man shot to death four years earlier in Boady’s own home. Ben’s daughter, Emma, has lived with Boady and Boady’s wife, Dee, ever since that awful night. Now 14 years old, Emma has been growing distant and soon makes a fateful choice that takes her far from the safety of her godparents.
About the Book
A lawyer's race to reveal a wrongful conviction collides with the dark shadow of a murder in his own home in this propulsive and perfectly-plotted thriller from "one of our best crime writers at the top of his game" (William Kent Krueger, New York Times bestselling author).
When Boady Sanden first receives the case of Elijah Matthews, he’s certain there’s not much he can do. Elijah, who believes himself to be a prophet, has been locked up in a psychiatric hospital for the past four years, convicted of brutally murdering the pastor of a megachurch. But as a law professor working for the Innocence Project, Boady agrees to look into Elijah’s file. When he does, he is alarmed to find threads that lead back to the death of his colleague and friend, Ben Pruitt, a man shot to death four years earlier in Boady’s own home.
Ben’s daughter, Emma, has lived with Boady and Boady’s wife, Dee, ever since that awful night. Now 14 years old, Emma has been growing distant and soon makes a fateful choice that takes her far from the safety of her godparents. Desperate to bring her home, and to free an innocent man, Boady must do all he can to investigate Elijah’s case while fighting to save the family he has deeply come to love.
Written with energy, propulsion, and his characteristic pathos and insight, Eskens delivers another pitch-perfect legal thriller that reveals a twisted murder and explores faith, love, family and redemption along the way.
Audiobook available; read by Gary Tiedemann, Matt Godfrey, Saskia Maarleveld, Janina Edwards and Timothy Pabon
