Bret Lott

Living with her son, Mahlon, and daughter-in-law, Ruth, since the death of her husband, Naomi faces a new tragedy when Mahlon is killed in an accident, sending Naomi and Ruth on a painful journey of reconciliation and forgiveness.

While most of the residents in the wealthy, historic Charleston enclave of Landgrave Hall are asleep at two-thirty in the morning, Huger Dillard and his father, Unc, are heading to the adjoining golf course. Blinded by a terrible accident that killed his wife, Unc prefers to practice his golf game when no one is watching. But before anyone can even tee off, Huger makes a grisly find: a woman's body, anchored deep in the mud. The discovery sets off...

In the backwoods of Mississippi, Jewel, her husband Leston, and their five children learn to cope with their last-born child, Brenda Kay, born mentally retarded in 1943.