A Riveting Story of Love, Hate, Greed, and Thirst for Revenge in an Oil-Drenched 1920s Southern Boom Town

When Henry Grant returns home from WWI, he finds his family decimated by violence, death, and debt. He blames it all on one man and aims to make him pay.

In 1922, Henry follows the fellow from Indiana to Berrytown in southern Arkansas, site of the nation’s latest oil boom, a good place to hide and a hard place to search. It’s overflowing with lease hounds, roughnecks, drillers, bootleggers, and gamblers. Crime is rampant, and the Ku Klux Klan is gearing up against booze, prostitution, and Black people.

Meanwhile, Mary Dutton, a near-destitute Berrytown widow with a twelve-year-old son, is struggling to survive. She works in a pharmacy where the owners—Mary’s cousin Eunice and her husband—are forcing her to sell marijuana, cocaine, and heroin under the nose of federal agents.

Otis Leatherwood, a farmer who is Mary’s uncle and Eunice’s estranged father, likes moonshine and is unaware of the drug traffic. His problem is with the oil. He believes drilling is ruining the environment, and he’s willing to risk everything to stop it. Even though his best friend and Black neighbor Isaiah Watson sees it as a means of escaping bigotry in the South.

As Berrytown grows apace and oil blackens the land, each of them faces life-changing decisions. Read now and follow them as they encounter one surprising turn of events after another.