Stanley Yelnats is under a curse. How else can anyone explain how stolen sneakers falling from the sky could land him at Camp Green Lake Correctional Facility? There is no lake at Camp Green Lake. It's just an endless expanse of bone-dry land riddled with rattlesnakes, scorpions, and holes. The holes are dug day after day by the maltreated, overworked, and water-deprived inmates of Camp Green Lake. If it weren't for the family curse—started by his no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing great-great-grandfather—Stanley knows he wouldn't be in this mess. But now that he is, will he ever get out?