On an October night in 1963, the lives of two families, one black, one white, intersected in ways they never could have imagined. An innocent peck on the cheek after a victorious football game was all it took for evil to descend on the small town of Oakwood, Arkansas, bringing with it a trail of brutality, death and destruction.Eddie Thorpe was a white racist, one in a long line. Winston Roberts was a black man who had seen the evils of racism up close. On that fateful night, Winston's son Willis was brutally killed. His daughter, Annalee, and Eddie's daughter, Maggie, were raped and beaten to within an inch of their lives. Set against the backdrop of the Civil Rights Movement, we follow Eddie Thorpe, as he struggles against the changes coming to his white world. Later, he begins to show a few cracks in his racist armor. But it is through Maggie that he really begins to have his eyes opened. Winston has seen enough violence and hatred to last him a lifetime, and he just wants to wait and see if the local sheriff will find his son's killers. But Annalee cannot just sit and wait. She embarks on a journey to find the missing Maggie to corroborate her own memory of the events.We meet brutal killers: Jack Beauford, Leland Harper, and their sons and cohorts. Corrupt lawmen: Sheriff Davis who has been a pawn for the local KKK, and Deputy Jimmy Moore, who is a card-carrying Klansman. Some who are on the fence about the way things have always been done, like Irene Thorpe. Others who are so distraught by the tragedies in their own lives that they cannot focus on the bigger picture: the widowed Vivian Beauford, whose son killed his father then took his own life; and the sheriff's wife, Pansy Davis. Each of these people must face the questions of right and wrong during the arc of the story. And we meet one wise old Choctaw woman who plays a vital role in several intertwining lives.