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THE KILL CLAUSE begins in the midst of a tragedy, perhaps the worst personal tragedy the mind can comprehend. On her seventh birthday Ginny Rackley is abducted, raped and brutally murdered. The first chapter opens with her parents, Tim and Dray Rackley, receiving the news and continues with an unblinking description of their reaction to the permanent horror that has entered their lives. A suspect is almost immediately arrested and the case appears to be open and shut, until a surprise revelation destroys the prosecution's case. The result is that a monstrous murderer walks free.
Tim and Dray are both members of law enforcement --- Tim is a U.S. Marshal, Dray is an L.A. County Sheriff --- and the horror of their loss is multiplied by the fact that the system they are sworn to uphold has set the murderer of their only daughter free. Tim and Dray seem to freefall through life while grief and sadness cause their marriage to slowly but inexorably self-destruct.
Things begin to change, however, when Tim is approached by an enigmatic man with a mysterious offer that gives Tim the opportunity to set things right. Tim is offered membership into the Commission, a shadowy group of five men and one woman, all professionals in their respective fields, all of whom have watched the murderers of loved ones go free. The Commission seeks to right judicial wrongs by executing murderers freed by the legal system --- and one of the individuals targeted by the Commission is Ginny's murderer. The Commission appears to be the ideal check and balance to a court system that seems to punish the victim and protect the criminal. Nothing though is as simple as it appears, and the Commission seemingly hides the darkest, most terrible secret of all.
THE KILL CLAUSE is loaded with moral dilemmas. Some (including this reviewer) may find the ending not to be entirely satisfying, but the ultimate aim of this fine novel is not simply to entertain but to get the reader thinking about the consequences of stepping outside the system in order to obtain a measure of justice that otherwise is denied. If that was indeed Hurwitz's intent, he has succeeded. THE KILL CLAUSE will keep you awake and thinking --- both while you read it and after you finish it.
--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
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