Brendan Cortland is a broken man. Middle-aged, pasty, pudgy, and fearful, he suffers from clear signs of post-traumatic stress: chronic depression, nightmares, and agoraphobia. He’s barricaded in a mansion, surrounded by extravagant and bizarre purchases, living a solitary existence with only a surly housekeeper for company. His contact with the outside world is limited to shopping online—as well as trolling clandestine chatrooms, hunting pedophiles—and a weekly session with his psychiatrist, to whom he describes ongoing dreams of being devoured by hordes of predators, usually snakes. The doctor suspects catastrophic abuse, and maybe something more, but in all his years of therapy, Brendan never divulged the deepest source of his trauma.

On his 47th birthday, Brendan is more despondent than usual. His son didn’t even call or text. Longing to heal, desperate to feel “normal” and to redeem himself in the eyes of his estranged family, Brendan embarks on a quest for justice. It’s the terrifying step he’s avoided for decades: going public with his story. With the help of Dylan James, a whip-smart young attorney, Brendan files a lawsuit against Torburton Hall, the elite New England private school he attended as a boy. Dylan warns him that prepping for the case would mean dredging up the painful memories he’d rather keep buried.

Still, no one is prepared for the shocking revelations and horrible secrets that emerge during the trial…least of all Brendan himself.