Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin

Silas is a black deputy sheriff and Larry is a white mechanic in a small Mississippi town where their separately lived adult lives hide the fact that as young boys they were close friends. A lonely odd duck, Larry was blamed for the unproven death of a girl who went missing some twenty years earlier. The men's lives begin to come together after a second girl disappears. Larry, once again, takes the blame, and Silas takes on the task of solving the crime. Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter not only gives us a good who-dunnit, but also impels us to think about social ostracism, race relations, and male friendship.