Until
the phone calls came at three o'clock on a November morning, the Golds and their
neighbors, the Hartes, had been inseparable. It was no surprise to anyone when
their teenage children, Chris and Emily, began showing signs that their
relationship was moving beyond that of lifelong friends. But now
seventeen-year-old Emily is dead—shot with a gun her beloved and devoted Chris
pilfered from his father's cabinet as part of an apparent suicide pact—leaving
two devastated families stranded in the dark and dense predawn, desperate for
answers about an unthinkable act and the children they never really knew. From New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult—one of the most powerful writers in contemporary fiction—comes a riveting, timely, heartbreaking, and terrifying novel of families in anguish and friendships ripped apart by inconceivable violence.