After Woodrow Harper's father is killed in an automobile accident, he and his mother move to his father's hometown of Lawton, Oklahoma, to start a new life. Perhaps here he will be able to feel close to his father in a way that eluded him when his father was alive. Instead, in his new next-door neighbor, Senator Crawford, Woodrow finds both a father figure who shares Woodrow's interests and understands him in a way his own father never did, and a respected member of the community who will help him find friends in his new home.But in 1923 there are ugly secrets beneath the surface in Lawton, and the senator is at the heart of them. Woodrow's need to belong leads him to desperate choices that force him to betray everything his father believed in.George Edward Stanley's novel is a powerful depiction of a shameful chapter in American history, as well as a deeply personal story of a boy's struggle to discover who his father was -- and who he wants to become.