The Speed of Life

by James Victor Jordan

What happens when a brutal crime threatens a mother's love for her son? An old Florida family and those in their orbit get caught in a torrent of passion, a deadly legal system, and the mythology of the Everglades, which runs as deep as this story does. Propulsive, engaging, evocative, beautiful writing. Estella Verus - part Seminole, part black, part white - a federal prosecutor in South Florida, is the victim of a home invasion during which she is savagely beaten. The perpetrator leaves a note saying that Estella's son, Andrew, sent him to do it. When Andrew is charged with complicity in the crime, Estella is desperate to talk to him in her efforts to discover the truth, but while she's still in the hospital recovering from her injuries, Andrew's lawyer has her served with a restraining order, preventing her from talking to him to protect his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. Thus begins The Speed of Life, literary fiction told through multiple plots by multiple narr…