A Time to Kill [antikvár]

AUTHOR'S NOTE ¦ t Since I am prone to start projects that never quite get finished, my goal when I began writing this book was simply to complete it. I could envision a neat pile of ty^d pages over in the comer of my office, and one day I would be able to point to it with some measure of pride and explain to clients and friends that it was a novel I had written. Surely, somewhere in the deep recesses of my mind, I dreamed of getting it published, but I honestly can't remember such thoughts, at least not when I started writing. It would become my first prolonged effort at fiction. I began in the fall of 1984, just three years out of law school and still very wet behind the ears. In those early days of my legal career I spent many hours in courtrooms, watching good lawyers try their cases. I have always been fascinated by courtrooms—still am. People discuss things in open court that they wouldn't dare mention outside their homes. The greatest dramas occur not on screens or stages, but in countless courtrooms across this country. One day I stumbled upon a horrible trial in which a young giri testified against the man who brutally raped her. It was a gut-wrenching experience for me, and I was only a spectator. One moment she was courageous, the next pitifully frail. I was mesmerized. I could not imagine the nightmare she and her family had been through. I wondered what I would do if she were my daughter. As I watched her suffer before the jury, I wanted per- V i,