The Good Father by Noah Hawley

It is hard to understand why an intelligent young man, with no criminal record or violent tendencies, would assassinate a prominent politician. Imagine how hard it would be to understand such an act if the young man were your own child. In this novel, Noah Hawley puts the reader in the shoes of Dr. Paul Allen, a prominent physician, who tries to prove that his son Daniel is innocent of killing a presidential candidate. While Hawley doesn’t turn the novel into a treatise on crime, he clearly points a finger at Allen for being a poor father, too caught up in his career and a second marriage to notice his son drifting away from him. In light of the recent shooting in Aurora, Colorado, the novel provides an eerie window into an assassin’s lonely and twisted logic. (Doubleday)