At once an engrossing murder mystery and an unflinching portrait of racial injustice, Intruder in the Dust is the story of Lucas Beauchamp, a black man wrongly arrested for the murder of a white man, Vinson Gowrie. Confronting the threat of lynching, Lucas sets out to prove his innocence, aided by a white lawyer, Gavin Stevens, and his young nephew, Chick Mallison.