To escape from his violent, drunken father, Huckleberry Finn, a thirteen-year-old boy from the wrong side of the tracks, fakes his own death and floats away on a raft down the Mississippi River with Jim, a runaway slave. In a series of unforgettable adventures narrated by Huck, they encounter a cross- section of characters from slave-hunters, thieves and conmen to feuding aristocrats.The first major American novel to be written in the vernacular, this dark, funny satire exposes the bigotry and hypocrisy of provincial America during Twain"s lifetime.