In 1954 Virginia, the Arizona Mojave rattlesnake named Charlemagne is sold to a Pentecostal snake-handling preacher. Here, a new adventure awaits a deadly rattlesnake who is no stranger to striking a venomous death to those who seek to control his life and fate. This story also brings to life Johnny Ray Rambo, a Black Korea war veteran, and an aspiring R&B songwriter in Los Angeles, and tells of Rose Marie Deveroux, a devout young Catholic woman fighting the forever disease of schizophrenia and an unsuspecting young man, who discovers love in her body and a soul. All are bound together Labor Day weekend, Virginia, 1954.