David Speck
Truman Capote's semi-autobiographical first novel about coming of age in the Deep South during the 1930s centers on 13-year-old Joel Sansom (David Speck), who reunites with his estranged father at the family's shabby plantation, where he must contend with his father's feisty mistress and a strange cousin. Against this less-than-ideal backdrop, Joel slowly matures into an upstanding young man.
A street-wise kid, Mark Sway, sees the suicide of Jerome Clifford, a prominent Louisiana lawyer, whose current client is Barry 'The Blade' Muldano, a Mafia hit-man. Before Jerome shoots himself, he tells Mark where the body of a Senator is buried. Clifford shoots himself and Mark is found at the scene, and both the FBI and the Mafia quickly realize that Mark probably knows more than he says.
