


They were friends as kids, at least of a sort. The area constable helping out with the crime is Silas "32" Jones, a onetime high school baseball hero who knows Larry a lot better than most of the town imagines. That legacy comes back with a vengeance when another woman in town disappears. Maybe it's because when he was in high school, he was accused of killing a fellow student. He keeps up his deceased dad's car repair place, despite having no customers, and visits his mom in the nursing home. He's a bit of a geek, but not the kind with technical skills.

Larry Ott is the outcast of rural Chabot, Miss. By Tom Franklin hardcover, 288 pages William Morrow, list price: $24.99
