Sleepy Benteen County, Kansas turns frantic on election day. Sheriff English, better known as Englishman, faces his toughest reelection challenge yet. The radical religious right is out to unseat him. Englishman's only available deputy isn't winning him votes, not after ramming a school bus carrying a local teen choir. Englishman's brother, Mad Dog, a born-again Cheyenne, rushes back from a quest to the Black Hills. He had a premonition that the sheriff was in danger. The sheriff's daughters, attending separate colleges, wake with similar premonitions, then cut classes and hurry home to keep their father safe. Then, a student smuggles a gun into the school and begins shooting and taking hostages. And there's the private army that has seized a nearby farm and holding citizens, including Mad Dog, against their will. And, Englishman needs to clear up one little thing about his deputy's accident: Benteen County doesn't have a teen choir.