Drugs, a Goth teenage girl, a sly general store owner, old bones, and a murder at the Peek-A-Boo Trailer Park connect in this second book in the Page Erwin series set in rural Down East Maine. (Definitely not the quaint Maine on post cards.)

Sheriff Sam Barrows is in denial over his love for the stunning Lieutenant Belle Whittaker of the State Police Crime Unit, a half Maliseet Indian and his former partner. Instead he married pretty Darla, a high school guidance counselor and sea captain’s daughter. To help combat crime in Thoreau County he enlists the aid of Frank Zucchetti, former OSI investigator who, with his wife, Sandy, runs an organic farm. Crime erupts with a shoot-out in Chapter One followed by two murders and the churned-up bones of a cold case. A crime scene goes missing as a dirty deputy, and evil Goth-girl leave a trail of misleading clues. Meanwhile, a Mafia connection sends Belle to Vegas.

Trouble with Sam is he’s unable to deal well with authority, the press, or his young, mercurial wife. Darla becomes pregnant then tragically loses the baby, and communication shuts down in the shadow of the beautiful Belle. Game Warden Bud Varney saves Sam’s bacon more than once. The theme of alienation prevails as Sam feels the sting of distrust from the locals. After all, he’s “from away”―Portland! Still, with the help of Frank, Bud and Belle, Sam works the cases and unearths the link between Venice’s drug problem and a twenty-five-year-old case the Mafia covered up. Sam’s quest for a safer Thoreau County and normalcy in his personal life leads to self-discovery in a bittersweet ending.