Stanley Yelnats’ family has been cursed for generations, so he isn’t too surprised when he is falsely accused of stealing a pair of shoes and sentenced to 18 months at a boys’ juvenile detention centre. At Camp Green Lake the boys must dig a hole a day, five feet deep, five feet across, in the rock hard, dried up lake bed. The Warden claims the labour is character building, but it is a lie. When Stanley finally gathers up the courage to escape the camp, he stumbles across a secret that will expose Camp Green Lake for the evil place that it is, and erase the Yelnats family curse forever.