The winter solstice festival of the Druids in Arkansas is marred by the murder of a doctor, the cult's principal benefactor. As bookstore owner and sleuth Claire Malloy investigates, suspicion centers on members of the cult who were his tenants.

A renaissance fair is coming to the relatively quiet college town of Farberville, Arkansas. Though resistant to getting involved, Claire Malloy, local bookseller and mother of the perpetually petulant teen Caron, finds herself drawn into the strange inner workings of the group putting on the fair. But a dark mood falls over the festivities when one of the organizers is a victim of arson, and her body is found in the burned wreckage of her rented house....

Finding what she hopes will be an ideal house to share with her new husband and teenage daughter, Claire Malloy learns that the property's previous owner died under suspicious circumstances and that a real estate agent has gone missing.

"Claire Malloy, for as long as she can remember, has been the local bookseller and owner of the Book Depot and the widowed mother of teenage Caron, who frequently speaks in ALL CAPS. But her life has changed dramatically in recent years. Claire has married her longtime beau, Deputy Police Chief Peter Rosen. Still the owner of the Book Depot, Claire has passed the day-to-day running of it on to her very efficient employees. With Caron inching ever...