Desert Discord

It's 1970 in the small West Texas city of Duro.

Andy is a twenty-three-year-old classical musician who moves around in all strata of society, from the elite to petty criminals. One night, he is attacked and beaten unconscious by young men who think he is gay, and he sustains a serious brain injury. As he gradually recovers, he is changed. He has difficulty speaking and is subject to terrifying nightmares and vivid musical hallucinations.

Andy's roommates, Douglas and Reed, are trying to grow a successful marijuana crop on a barren vacant lot despite the desert heat, the police, the marauding deer, and their own ineptitude. A millionaire oilman stages the kidnapping of his wayward grandson to "deprogram" him, only to have the plan go horribly wrong. Two teenaged girls vanish under strange circumstances, and some suspect Andy may be involved. Meanwhile, the young musician observes it all with his damaged but still brilliant mind.

Henry D. Terrell's quirky yet believable characters blur the lines of class and order, and his story remains tense and propulsive throughout a complex and freewheeling plot.