It was a fire that could be seen for miles, a fire that split the community, a fire that turned families on each other, a fire that its still hard to get a straight answer about. A quarter of a century ago, someone held a match to Greenwood, Texass cotton. Stephen Graham Jones was twelve that year. What he remembers best, whats stuck with him all this time, is that nobody ever came forward to claim that destruction.And nobody was ever caught.Greenwood just leaned forward into next years work, and the year after thats, pretending that the fire had never happened. But it had. This fire, it didnt start twenty-five years ago. It had been smoldering for years by then. And everybody knew it. Getting them to say anything about its another thing, though. Now Stephens going back. His first time since high school, and maybe his last. For answers, for closure, for the people who cant go back. The ones who never got to leave.Part mystery, part memoir, 'Growing Up Dead in Texas' is packed with more secrets than your average graveyard. Stephen Graham Jones breakout novel is a story about farming. A story about Texas. A story about finally standing up from the dead and walking away.