From up-and-coming author Rae Meadows, an addictive, absorbing novel with a lovable basket-case heroine who becomes obsessed with a murder case. Grace, 35, copyedits other people's writing for a magazine, drinks alone in the same bar every night, and observes the vibrant life of New York City from the sidelines. But when a local co-ed is found dead, and a college student from Grace's Ohio hometown is arrested for the murder, something within her stirs. The newspapers claim that Charles, a college freshman, is a spoiled rich kid who killed because of a rebuffed sexual advance. Yet Grace senses deeper layers to the story and becomes consumed by discovering the truth behind the crime. Through letters and phone conversations, Grace and Charles gradually draw each other out, and her obsession grows. When her father has a stroke and she is called home, Grace continues her investigation of Charles in the place where they both grew up. But living amidst her parents in the house of her youth, dark parts of her childhood resurface including the details surrounding the death of her younger sister twenty-five years earlier. As Grace chases Charles's mystery, she inadvertently chases her own.