Buddy Glass is the second-eldest son in the eccentric and enchanting Glass family. He is on leave from the army during World War II, attending the wedding of his eldest brother, Seymour. But the wedding is not a happy one: it is overcast by a sense of strange suspense. Perhaps everyone is aware, on some level, of what is to come. And in the years after the tragedy, Buddy is haunted by memories of Seymour, turning over in his mind everything that came to pass with his deeply complex and unhappy older brother.
With painful tenderness and great subtlety, Salinger unfolds a story of family tragedy from the point of view of one character - Buddy - who has long been suspected to be a portrait of the author himself.