This masterful fictionalized narrative by and about Augustine Finley, the only hanging victim in Floyd County, Kentucky (in 1885), tells the story of several characters who were deeply impacted by that ignoble deed. The victim is portrayed as one of the most decent characters in the book. The concept of disembodied souls visiting and instructing common people plays prominently in this book. Not only is the hanging victim visited by a wise and influential teacher in his dreams prior to his hanging, but he himself also later becomes a powerful teacher to another life in it's moment of crisis. The reader is given the notion of a continuous thread of such beneficial contact by souls who have passed on, to the benefit of those most in need of their instruction. ( )