White ex-con Cal Winter comes home one day to find his gorgeous young, black wife drowned in the pool. Prudence couldn't swim and Cal concludes she didn't get in the water willingly: he suspects murder. This darkly humorous journey takes readers along with Cal and his prison homie Red Eye as they set out to find the killer, taking them into a world full of the sexual urges of the rich and powerful. Intricate and mesmerising, this racially charged novel reflects strands of the author's own complicated and quixotic life.