It is the summer of 1955, and ten-year-old Toby and his mother, Rosemary are driving from Florida to Utah in their decrepit car. They are on their way to Utah to make their fortune by mining uranium ore, and to escape Roy, an abusive ex-husband of Rosemary's who she has taken up with again. The car overheats and they stop to let it cool. While Rosemary and Toby are waiting, they see a big truck careen over the road's guardrails and fall hundreds of feet into the river gorge below. For the remainder of the day, Rosemary dotes on Toby and he takes advantage of her sentimentality to buy Indian souvenirs. Toby and Rosemary have faith that their luck will change for the better once they arrive in Utah. Rosemary recalls how when she was a child, before the ##Stock Market Crash of 1929# she lived in a big house in Beverly Hills. Her father was a "paper millionaire," and Rosemary dreams of return to this comfortable lifestyle. When they arrive in Moab, Utah, however, Toby and his mother find that they are months too late. People just like them have swarmed the state's mining towns looking for fast money and a new life. This sudden influx of people has turned Moab into a dangerous slum. There are no jobs, and the Geiger counters necessary for mining are overpriced. Rosemary decides to buy a "poor man's Geiger counter"—a black light which supposedly makes uranium glow—and to drive to Salt Lake City, where she is confident she will find work.
Chapter 2
Toby wishes to change himself, and vows not to be the same boy he was in Florida. Toby wants to change his name to Jack, after the author Jack London, and his mother begrudgingly concedes on the condition that Toby enroll in catechism classes and take Jonathan as his baptismal name. Toby's father, who is now married to a rich woman in Connecticut, does not want Toby to change his name or become a Catholic, and claims that Toby will be breaking with family tradition. This tradition, Toby later learns, is a lie. Toby...