The Education of Asa Paxton: Coming of Age in the Heart of Dixie offers an historic view of rural life in the South through the eyes of young adults--the self-proclaimed Misfit Clique--who suffer through puberty's awkward, embarrassing, and sometimes humorous moments. Asa emerges at seventeen a handsome young man, still an outcast because of the company his family keeps. Secrets soon collide with the force of a tornado, threatening to tear families apart and send the innocent to prison--or worse.