The Sweet Hereafter is a multiple first-person narrative depicting life in a small town in Upstate New York in the wake of a school bus accident in which many local children are killed.

At first the parents are reluctant to do so, but eventually they are persuaded by the lawyer that filing a class action lawsuit would ease their minds and also be the right thing to do.

In particular, the deposition of 14-year-old Nichole Burnell, who was sitting at the front of the bus and is now paralyzed from the waist down by the accident, is considered all-important.

Only the reader knows that Mitchell Stephens, the lawyer, has just learned that he has effectively lost his own child—his estranged, drug-addicted daughter informs him that she has just tested HIV-positive.

[2][page needed] The driver of the truck, Ruben Perez, was found to be at fault for the crash by the National Transportation Safety Board.

The State Bar of Texas sought to bring actions against lawyers whom it believed to be paying people to refer clients to them.