He is haunted by the memory of sitting in his father’s car at four years old and releasing the clutch. Bob, divorced and childless, works for Legal Aid. He lives with his wife and their three children. He has gone on to work for a large law firm in the city, representing white-collar defendants. Jim gained fame and fortune after winning the acquittal of a man accused of murder. Although they are both attorneys, the brothers have taken different paths. After Zach is arrested and charged, Susan calls her brothers who are both lawyers living in New York City. Things come to a head when nineteen-year-old Zach Olson, Susan's son, throws a pig's head into the local mosque during the holy time of Ramadan, leading to his arrest and the threat of a federal hate crime charge. The Somali’s integration into the community has not been easy, as their customs are different and the language barrier often leads to misunderstandings. Bob, Jim, and Susan Burgess grew up in tiny Shirley Falls, a small town in Maine that has been on the decline for a while but has recently seen an influx of immigrants from Somalia. The book follows a year in the life of Bob and Jim Burgess, who have escaped their small hometown in Maine for New York. The novel is set in the fictional New England town of Shirley Falls, which was also the setting of Strout's first novel, Amy and Isabelle. Strout’s fourth novel, it tells the story of two brothers who return home to help their sister after her son is accused of a hate crime. The Burgess Boys is a novel by American author Elizabeth Strout, published by Random House in 2013.

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