Until that September of 1952 Luke Chandler had never kept a secret or told a single lie. But in the long hot summer of his seventh year two groups of migrant workers — and two very dangerous men — came through the Arkansas Delta to work the Chandler cotton farm. And suddenly mysteries are flooding Luke’s world.
A brutal murder leaves the town seething in gossip and suspicion. A beautiful young woman ignites forbidden passions. A fatherless baby is born ... and someone has begun furtively painting the bare clapboards of the Chandler farmhouse slowly painstakingly bathing the run-down structure in gleaming white. And as young Luke watches the world around him he unravels secrets that could shatter lives — and change his family and his town forever....
