Paris Trout: A Novel (Random House trade paperback edition.)

Pete Dexter's National Book Awardwinning tour de force tells the mesmerizing story of a shocking crime that shatters lives and exposes the hypocrisies of a small Southern town.

The time and place: Cotton Point, Georgia, just after World War II.

The event: the murder of a fourteen-year-old black girl by a respected white citizen named Paris Trout, who feels he's done absolutely nothing wrong.

As a trial looms, the crime eats away at the social fabric of Cotton Point, through its facade of manners and civility.

Trout's indifference haunts his defense lawyer; his festering paranoia warps his timid, quiet wife; and Trout himself moves closer to madness as he becomes obsessed with his causeand his vendettas.

Praise for Paris Trout ';A masterpiece, complex and breathtaking . . . [Pete] Dexter portrays his characters with marvelous sharpness.'Los Angeles Times ';A psychological spellbinder that will take your breath away and probably interfere with your sleep.'The Washington Post Book World ';Dexter's brilliant understanding of the Deep South has allowed him to capture much of its essenceits bitter class distinctions, its violence, its strangenesswith a fidelity of detail and an ear for speech that I have rarely encountered since Flannery O'Connor.'William Styron ';Dexter's powerfully emotional novel doesn't have any brakes.

Hang on, because you won't be able to stop until the finish.'Chicago Tribune