In a steamy East Texas town, surrounded by oilfield grit and 1960s racial tension, devout eighteen-year-old Peter Looucas faces the prospect of the Viet Nam draft. The sudden death of his father and then his witness of a lynching, thrust him headlong into a fraught adulthood. A summer job in the oilfield leads to a taboo connection with Swat, a black veteran of the Korean War. While his community tries to keep him on track, Pete finds a confidant in Gwynn, a Berkely student temporarily stranded in Texas. The tug-of-war between Pete's beliefs and the newly discovered complexity around morality and integrity force Pete into a dangerous spiritual reckoning.

This debut novel, in which landscape is a character in its own right, weaves together the pain, the joy and the unexpected twists in creating a life that can be lived with.

.