Everyone in the small town of Stillwater, Mississippi believes that Clay Montgomery had murdered his stepfather.  No one knows the real truth except for Clay, his mother and sisters.  The ugly truth is something that Clay is determined to keep hidden and for more reasons than just keeping himself out of jail.  Allie McCormick is a cold-case detective from Chicago who returns home to be with her family after her divorce.  Trying to carve out a new life for her and her daughter, she takes a job with the local police department, a job that makes her father her boss and puts her in direct conflict with Clay.  Even though everyone believes Clay is a murderer, Allie sees a different side of him.  A side that makes her rethink that long held belief and as she starts investigating she discovers that things are nothing like they appear.  As she and Clay grow closer, so do many truths, truths which will devastate more than Clay and his family, but also Allie’s family as well.

I had been waiting for Dead Giveaway since the moment I finished the last page of Dead Silence and as soon as it arrived I drove in!  Murder, small town secrets, love and passion grabbed me, and I was unable to stop reading.  I found it difficult to like or come to care for Allie’s father or Clay’s mother, however Clay and Allie drive this story with the love that neither were looking for.  Brenda Novak is a storyteller that keeps the twists and turns coming so that you don’t know what’s going to happen from one moment to the next.  I don’t know how I’m going to wait for Dead Right, the last book in this trilogy!