Two young boys, Larry and Silas, become friends in rural Mississippi in the late 1970s. A girl, Cindy Walker, disappears, feared dead, and suspicion falls on Larry.
Twenty-five years later, Larry is an outcast in the area, and Silas is now a police officer, investigating the disappearance of a local girl, Tina Rutherford. Larry is again a suspect, even after he is found shot and badly wounded in his own home. Silas investigates the crime and is forced to re-examine his own history. After Silas has confessed about the events of 1982, he and Larry can begin to mend their friendship.
What follows in this section is a brief chapter-by-chapter summary of the novel. Some of the chapters are based entirely or largely in the past, as the novel covers two different periods (1979–1982 and two weeks in 2007), and these flashbacks are indicated in the summaries.
one
The novel starts with Larry Ott, a 41-year old man who lives alone in his parents’ house. He wakes up and goes about his morning routine, looking after his chickens, and heads off to work in his father’s car repair workshop, Ottomotive. On the way he gets a call from his mother, who is in a nursing home, saying that she would like to see him. He heads back home. When he walks into his house he is ambushed by an intruder wearing an old zombie mask which Larry has had since he was a boy. The intruder shoots him and then watches him bleeding out on the kitchen floor.
two
Police Constable Silas “32” Jones is patrolling when he sees an unusually large number of buzzards – carrion eater birds – hovering over an area of woodland. He investigates, hoping/fearing that he will find the corpse of a missing girl, Tina Rutherford. Instead he finds the body of Morton ”M&M” Morrisette in a swamp. M&M was a local marijuana dealer with whom Silas had played baseball and been good friends in high school.
Local detective and investigator Roy French arrives, followed by other officials, including Silas’ girlfriend Angie, an EMT (emergency medical technician).
Later, back in the office he shares with Miss Voncille, the city clerk, Silas is visited by French, who says that he had visited Larry Ott regarding the missing Rutherford girl. Silas follows up on a report that a rattlesnake has been found in someones mailbox. The mailbox belongs to a woman named Irina who shares a house with two other divorcees in a run-down area populated by poor whites.
Silas is doing his shift directing traffic later that day when he receives an ominous phone call from Angie, who is now at Ott’s house.
three
This chapter is a flashback, beginning in March 1979. Larry recalls his father driving him to school one freezing cold morning. They see Silas and his mother, Alice, waiting by the road and pick them up. Familiarity between Larrys father and Alice Jones is implied. Larrys mother seems surprised and a little suspicious when he tells her about it later when she picks him up from school. This is repeated for days. Larrys mother quizzes him about the woman and how his father behaves with her. She drives Larry to school one day and it is obvious she and Alice know each other: She gives the Jones’ two second hand winter coats and makes a bitter comment before driving off and leaving them standing in the freezing cold.
Larry goes to find Silas in the woods, where the Jones family lives in a cabin. He seems to want to be friends with the other boy. He finds Silas, teaches him how to shoot, lends him a rifle and then leaves his gloves for the boy as well.
four
Back to the present: On the phone to Silas, Angie describes briefly what she has found at Larry’s place. Silas goes to investigate and is reminded of having been there once before when he and Larry were friends. French arrives and they examine the crime scene together (Larry is in hospital, badly wounded but not dead). After examining Ott’s house, Silas returns home to find that Larry had tried to call him earlier that day, leaving a message on his answer machine.
five
This very significant chapter shows how important Silas was for Larry, how lonely and withdrawn Larry is, and how unpleasant and dangerous both Carl Ott and his friend and neighbour Cecil Walker are. It also shows the reader one of the two events (the fight – the other being the disappearance of Cindy Walker) which permanently changed the course of Larry’s life.
Another chapter set in the past, this one describes events later in the year Silas and Larry first met, 1979, leading up to Carl forcing them to fight over the borrowed rifle. Silas beats Larry, who then calls him “n****r”, changing their relationship for ever.
six
This chapter is divided between the present day and a substantial section containing Silas’ recollections of his childhood and his journey with his mother from Chicago to Chabot.
Silas investigates further in Larry Ott’s life. He goes to Ott’s garage and then back to his house to look for further clues as to what has happened. He finds small pieces of glass and the butt of a joint. Being in Ott’s house triggers memories of his childhood.
Silas remembers his early life in Chicago, and how, after his mother’s boyfriend had been arrested and then gone on the run, he and his mother had left Chicago to head south to Mississippi, where she came from. As a child Silas had deeply resented his mother for her relationships with men and the way she took him out of the world he had known.
seven
Picking up in 1982, this chapter recounts Larry Ott’s connection to the disappearance of Cindy Walker and how those events shaped the rest of his life and the lives of his parents.
Cindy has encouraged Larry to take her out on a date. He believes they are going to the drive-in to see The Amityville Horror[8], but she tells him that he is to drop her off somewhere else so that she can see her secret boyfriend, and that because she is pregnant he must swear to never tell anyone about it. Larry follows her instructions, but she never appears at the arranged meeting place later that night. When he returns to the Walker’s house he is attacked by Cecil Walker. Soon after, the police are summoned.
Initially, Larry tells the sheriff an abbreviated version of what happened, leaving out specific details in order to protect Cindy and himself. But when, over time, witnesses mention having seen him leaving the drive-in, he becomes the focus of greater suspicion.
Eventually, Larry leaves to join the army. The suspicion and pressure put on him and his family have driven his father, who no longer speaks to him, to drink ever more heavily, and his mother has become increasingly withdrawn and depressed. While in the army he becomes a qualified mechanic. Returning to Chabot after his military service, Larry takes over his father’s garage after he dies in a drunk driving accident. His mother has to be moved into a nursing home. Larry is forced to sell large parts of his familys property to the Rutherford lumber business, and he lives solely on the money from those land sales. The garage generates no income.
eight
Silas meets Angie for lunch in the diner where his mother used to work. He confesses to Angie that he and Larry used to be friends and tells her his history, moving to Chabot from Chicago. He recalls an episode from their time at school together when Larry had been invited to a Halloween party because he had a cool zombie mask, but that he had been ignored by the other kids, including Silas and Cindy, and had eventually driven off alone. Silas lies to Angie about the nature of his relationship with Cindy. He later goes to the hospital to see Larry.
Larry has undergone surgery and is still unconscious. The nurse tells him that Larry was clinically dead at two points during the operations. After visiting Larry, Silas knows that he has to also inform Larry’s mother about the shooting.
