Amidst the economic depression and the racial tension of the 1930s, a boy discovers a horrible secret of his father's involvement in the Ku Klux Klan. It was 1933 and life was good for James William. Piece by piece, however, his comfortable life begins to unravel. First he learns that the burning of a black man's house was not accidental. Then his fishing buddy LeRoy tells him about the hanging tree and the Klan. Though he accepts that blacks and whites can't drink from the same fountains because "that's the way it is, " James William can't believe that racial hatred exists in his own community until he comes face to face with a Klan member. A thought-provoking story of one boy's loss of naivete in the face of harsh historical realities, Mississippi Morning will challenge young readers to question their own assumptions and confront personal decisions.