Frank Vaughn Killed by his Mom: 1 (Frank Vaughn Trilogy)

Its summer 1965 schools out and Butchs birthday is in a few weeks. Perfect; three months of freeze tag hide and seek and riding his bike way past dark. Well maybe not completely perfect - Frank Vaughn a classmate is beaten to death by his crazy mother for leaving a report card at school. Dad is touchier than ever and Mom sadder so best to hide out next door with his best friend Tommy reading X-Men and hoping for that birthday GI Joe. But in one night Butchs summer explodes and hes now riding across a turbulent and changing Dixie in a white Rambler station wagon at the mercy of a manic depressive and wildly violent Dad. Like a crewman on Ulysses ship Butch encounters a one-eyed evil grandfather a 12-year-old Siren the lotus-eaters of Alabama... and Frank Vaughn. If Butch ever sees his beloved sister Cindy again itll be a miracle. If hes alive at the end of the summer itll be a bigger one. A dark version of The Wonder Years Frank Vaughn Killed by his Mom is The Great Santini written by Homer careening through a coarse world of racism adultery abandonment and even the occasional hope.