In the long hot summer of 1972, three events shattered the serenity of ten-year-old Marsha's life: her father ran away with her mother's sister Ada; Boyd Ellison, a young boy, was molested and murdered; and Watergate made the headlines.

Living in a world no longer safe or familiar, Marsha turns increasingly to 'the book of evidence' in which she records the doings of the neighbours, especially of shy Mr Green next door. But as Marsha's confusion and the murder hunt both accelerate, her 'facts' spread the damage cruelly and catastrophically throughout the neighbourhood.