"The anti-capitol-punishment crowd—priests, nuns in lay clothes, kids from LSU with burning candles cupped in their hands—were praying outside the fence. But another group was there too—a strange combination of frat boys and rednecks—drinking beer from Styrofoam coolers filled with cracked ice; they were singing 'Glow, Little Glow Worm,' and holding signs that read This Bud for you, Massina and Johnny, start your own Sizzler franchise today." Chapter 1, pg. 1

"It was the south Louisiana I had grown up in, around New Iberia. Oak, cypress, and willow trees lines the two-lane road; the mist still clung like torn cotton to the half-submerged dead tree trunks back in the marsh; the canebrakes were thick and green, shining in the light, and the lily pads clustered along the bayou's banks were bursting with flowers, audibly popping, their leaves covered with drops of...