It was an utterly dishonest act plotted by perhaps the most honest and honorable people I have ever known. It was also a conspiracy worthy of Arthur Conan Doyle or Robert Louis Stevenson.   And I was to be part of it! 

A rare treasure, a treacherous conspiracy, and a first love set off this witty, wry romp through a depression-era, sleepy-seaside village’s rags-to-riches-to-rags story. During the summer of 1934 the town of Tesoro gets a taste of fortune when ten-year-old Conner O’Halloran discovers a chunk of ambergris encased in a thousand-pound blob of sewage-sludge that washed ashore. Instead of keeping the treasure of the blue whale to himself, he chooses to split the spoils equally with the town. The people react in a manic race to acquire useless trinkets—comically transforming the town into a bastion of consumerism. As they are otherwise-occupied, the miserly, cantankerous, and allegedly felonious local millionaire-villain devises a plan to cheat the town out of their new-found wealth. Fearing that the people will lose their homes and livelihood, Connor, together with a small group of sharp-minded, prominent townsfolk, attempt to out-swindle the master swindler. In this quirky coming-of-age fable of ruin and abundance, Connor learns what is real and what is simply sludge. As the sludge clears the town realizes they had the true treasure all along.