The Mad Cow Lesson

Walker, Jake and Sara’s mutt, won’t go into the yard one morning when he hears a strange hum in the air. When Jake Going learns he is being sent to Texas to meet with the state textbook committee, his life as the Language Arts Editorial Director for Blue Knight Publishing is turned upside down. He becomes immersed in the world of the cattle industry, Mad Cow disease, rendering, and prions. Blue Knight’s CEO is sending Jake and his colleagues on a Quixotic mission for his own purposes, wanting to get a new writing textbook approved by Texas; a book that mentions Mad Cow disease and the famous beef trial from a few years before. Meanwhile, Jake’s wife Sara, enjoying the summer between her first and second year of medical school, which she has begun in her mid-30s, goes for a run each day through Lincoln Park. While there she meets Wyle Beacon, a wizened 94-year-old who spends his days feeding squirrels. They become fast friends and Wylie regales Sara with tales of growing up in back woods Kentucky where they ate burgoo stew, hunted squirrels and quarreled with neighboring clans who saw squirrel brains as a delicacy. Follow the story of Jake and Sara’s summer as it unfolds against the twin backdrops of the Texas flatlands and Chicago’s lakeshore.