Thirty-three years ago, the state stole a man’s life with a lie. Now, one lawyer has twenty-eight days to expose the truth—before the executioner collects the debt.
Thomas Crane is a man defined by safety. A "beige" estate lawyer who deals in mineral rights and probate, he has spent twenty years building a fortress of predictability to keep the chaos of the world at bay. He straps his briefcase into the passenger seat. He never takes risks.
But Thomas’s safe world shatters during a sleepless night, while watching a retrospective on the infamous "Garage Killer" case.
Isaiah Perkins has spent three decades on Death Row for a double homicide he swears he didn't commit. The prosecution’s case was ironclad, built on a digital keypad log that placed Perkins at the scene at exactly 4:15 PM.
But Thomas hears something in the background of the old surveillance footage: the distinctive clack-whoosh of the Express train .
Thomas grew up on those tracks. He knows the 1992 schedule by heart. And he knows one terrifying fact: The Express didn’t run at 4:15 .
Driven by an obsession he can’t explain, Thomas peels back the layers of the conviction and uncovers a conspiracy buried in the archives of a utility commission: a city-wide blackout that rendered the digital lock dead, and a faded invoice for a backup battery with a handwritten note that reads "Job Incomplete".
The timestamp was a fabrication. The alibi was real. The man is innocent.
Now, with the Governor—the former prosecutor who built his career on this conviction—poised to sign the death warrant, Thomas must step out of his beige life and into the line of fire. Facing a corrupt detective who will destroy anyone to protect the verdict and a political machine that demands a body, Thomas risks his marriage, his career, and his sanity to save a stranger.
Justice was delayed. But the debt of time has finally come due.
Perfect for fans of John Grisham, Michael Connelly, and Scott Turow, The Debt of Time is a meticulous, heart-pounding legal thriller about the high price of truth.
Genre: Thriller
Thomas Crane is a man defined by safety. A "beige" estate lawyer who deals in mineral rights and probate, he has spent twenty years building a fortress of predictability to keep the chaos of the world at bay. He straps his briefcase into the passenger seat. He never takes risks.
But Thomas’s safe world shatters during a sleepless night, while watching a retrospective on the infamous "Garage Killer" case.
Isaiah Perkins has spent three decades on Death Row for a double homicide he swears he didn't commit. The prosecution’s case was ironclad, built on a digital keypad log that placed Perkins at the scene at exactly 4:15 PM.
But Thomas hears something in the background of the old surveillance footage: the distinctive clack-whoosh of the Express train .
Thomas grew up on those tracks. He knows the 1992 schedule by heart. And he knows one terrifying fact: The Express didn’t run at 4:15 .
Driven by an obsession he can’t explain, Thomas peels back the layers of the conviction and uncovers a conspiracy buried in the archives of a utility commission: a city-wide blackout that rendered the digital lock dead, and a faded invoice for a backup battery with a handwritten note that reads "Job Incomplete".
The timestamp was a fabrication. The alibi was real. The man is innocent.
Now, with the Governor—the former prosecutor who built his career on this conviction—poised to sign the death warrant, Thomas must step out of his beige life and into the line of fire. Facing a corrupt detective who will destroy anyone to protect the verdict and a political machine that demands a body, Thomas risks his marriage, his career, and his sanity to save a stranger.
Justice was delayed. But the debt of time has finally come due.
Perfect for fans of John Grisham, Michael Connelly, and Scott Turow, The Debt of Time is a meticulous, heart-pounding legal thriller about the high price of truth.
Genre: Thriller
Used availability for David Chisholm's The Debt of Time