On the Mississippi Gulf Coast in 1964, a murderer stalked Bernice Starling, a local blues singer, and killed her by driving a knife into her chest. After the murder, her two teenaged daughters, Jubilee and Charlene, search for the killer, driving their mother's antique red pick-up truck down sandy back roads, bayous, and to the smoky juke joints where their mother once sang. The strange characters who populate the Gulf Coast give them a host of suspects.