Jonny Zero is a cynical, embittered veteran of the Middle East wars, haunted by his experiences and struggling to readjust to civilian life. Physically and psychologically scarred, he finds solace in alcohol and writing, viewing the latter as his only trure religion. Jonny's story is interwoven with that of the reclusive and renowned writer Ruben Felton Meyer, whose seminal work "The Dying of the Boy" had a profound impact on the counterculture of the 1960s.