When the body of Jamal Cousin, president of the pre-eminent black fraternity at the Florida's flagship university, is discovered hogtied in the stygian water swamps of the Suwanee River, his death sets off a firestorm. And when a fellow student, Mark Towson, the president of a prominent white fraternity, is accused of the crime, the fire threatens to rage out of control. Contending with rising political tensions, racial unrest, and a sensational media, Towson’s defense attorney, Jack Swyteck, knows that the stakes could not be higher--inside or outside the old Suwanee County Couthouse.