Summary

The Prologue consists of the first installment of The Playing Fields Blog, an editorial written by a person identified only as “Your Neighbor” (1). The blog claims to share observations of Southern life for people who are not originally from the South. The writer decided she needed to begin writing the blog after a woman at the beauty shop asked her if she had ever heard of the hanging of an innocent man. She did not want people to think life in the South was like Gone With the Wind or the song The Night the Lights Went out in Georgia. The writer points out that people should learn to love their neighbors regardless how irritating these people are. She admits there are a few of her neighbors she daydreamed about killing.

In Chapter 1, Merilee Talbot Dunlap was divorced after 11 years of marriage...