Jesse the Oil Patch Kid

The son of an oil field worker of Irish descent, Jesse lives in a coastal town in south Louisiana. The culture is predominately French. Shortly after his mothers death, his father loses his job when the oil industry goes into a recession. His father accepts a job in the North Atlantic, leaving Jesse with Uncle Rufus, a disabled World War II veteran. Uncle Rufus is military oriented and unable to show his feelings.
Jesse feels he is a left-over kid and befriends an abandoned dock cat. Ole Tom can be aggravating and remains fiercely independent.
A life/death crisis develops when Uncle Rufus insists on battling the gulf for shrimp. Jesse rises to the challenge and discovers he is appreciated in his small town school.
Jesse is the story of a ten-year-old boy frustrated by circumstances beyond his control. Besides trying to fit into a culture different from his own, he is coping with his mothers death, his father having to leave because of job loss and living with his military minded uncle. Woven into these circumstances is the potential within Jesse, which he discovers in crisis that declared him a SOMEBODY in his NOBODY world.