Pastor Phillips is about to burn his own church to the ground. And the small town of January, Vermont will never be the same. Because unbeknownst to anyone, even himself, Pastor Phillips is about to kick-start The Rapture, at least in this corner of the county. And soon, Heaven's little train will roll into town to pick up the good and leave the bad behind. But Heaven, same as any bureaucracy, is subject to the occasional clerical error, and two boys will get left behind-with the bad, growing badder by the hour. Those who didn't make the cut to God's little after-party.
Because it turns out a church isn't just a joint for psalmody and prayer but a holding facility for sin. A junkyard of people's worst parts. Dropped off Sunday mornings for the better part of 200 years, it has now become a celestial biohazard. A busted landfill. Cracked and leaking into town. Making men sick.