Turning Angel by Greg Iles

Penn Cage is back!  This time out he's trying to prove the innocence of his childhood friend Dr. Drew Elliott. The good doctor is accused of raping and murdering a seventeen year-old girl.  It gets worse.  Much worse.  Iles takes the reader on a journey into drugs, sex, and blind ambition.  Some of the scenes are uncomfortable to read and seem designed more to titillate than to advance the story line.  But I think Iles is genuinely trying to touch upon some very uncomfortable topics-how an older man can talk himself into justifying a relationship with an underage girl, how a young man can be so damaged by war that he becomes a psychopath, and how hard it is to set limits on your own behavior when society seems out of control.  501 pages.