The HP

Much of the action of the novel takes place at the HP, Sam's nickname for the "higgledy-piggledy farmhouse" the Quinns moved into after their house burned. It has a long driveway, a chicken-scratch yard with rusted equipment, one bathroom for which a ball-peen hammer must be used to turn off the water in the sink, and a hallway with five doors that lead to inexplicable places. Even after twenty-eight years, it is still a joke that no one can find the bathroom on the first try.

The HP is where Gamma is murdered. It is the house from which the sisters are driven by Zach and Huck before Sam is shot and Charlie is raped. Rusty is stabbed outside the HP. It is also the house in which Sam, Charlie, and Ben review the security footage that reveals Judith Pinkman's participation in the school shooting. It is...