Accepting a job at a fledgling newspaper in his hometown of Natchez, Mississippi seems like a good resume-building opportunity to recent Vanderbilt graduate and aspiring sportswriter Rainer Landrou, so he moves back and opts to live with his dad to save money. The night job he takes at a hotel supplements the meager income he has settled for in pursuit of his calling, but once slammed with football season assignments, he soon finds his work schedule and his long-distance relationship with his girlfriend back in Nashville tricky to juggle. Talented, ambitious, and determined to make a name for himself, he decides to enter a contest for young sports journalists with a story on his former neighbor and high-school football coach, Joe “Judas” Cline, an NFL veteran who is suffering from early-onset Alzheimer’s. In the process of working on the feature, he gets to know Cline’s wife, Vicky, whose devotion to her husband impacts Rainer greatly.
When one of Rainer’s colleagues at the newspaper maneuvers the current climate of
political correctness to serve a personal vendetta, outside protesters and the mainstream media descend upon the historic town. The resulting turmoil dovetails with career frustrations which have been percolating in Rainer, and he makes a decision that he will deeply regret, one that affects the life of a childhood playmate with whom he has become reacquainted.
Trespassers Talking is a stirring, honest, and wit-filled account of a young millennial’s coming home to face an intense crash-course in real life, a season crammed with realizations regarding work, love, memories, social issues, stereotypes, and friendship.