An intense, immersive tale with masterful plotting. An essential read for those who love an intricately woven mystery that highlights loss, memory, retribution, and found family.

When a glamorous music professor is found dead in the carillon tower of Osley College, a small liberal arts college in the Driftless Region of western Wisconsin, Maude Ascham, the new chief of campus police, has her hands full. Her investigation leads to porn-watching students, an angry boyfriend, a betrayed lover, and feuding colleagues. Students, faculty, and staff: all are implicated. When the Dean of Libraries commits a gruesome suicide three weeks later, the investigation becomes more than a matter of murder.

Who is blackmailing James North, the bereaved, ex-hobo English professor and celebrated poet? Why would someone destroy the 175-year-old bonsai of the cantankerous college gardener? Was last December’s drowning of a senior music student really an accident? And what of Ariel Ellis, the eccentric, blue-haired barista who is clearly hiding something behind their theatrical banter; and Esha Larkin, the maps librarian seen weeping on the old library’s roof at dawn? Each appears to hold a vital piece of a dangerous puzzle. There is a killer on campus . . . can they be stopped?

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