The Book of Why

In the turbulent 1960s, childhood is a place where a boy sells lies for a dollar, names the sad houses in his neighborhood, and digs for fossils in the softening street. Toy dinosaurs wage wars on front lawns. A butterfly net sewn from a mother's dress strains to catch what the air will give. A father reads poetry instead of fairy tales and teaches his son that falling is part of flight.

Part fever dream, part elegy, The Book of Why summons a country on the verge-block parties and Super 8 ca...