Alma DeGeer Dunahew, the mother of three young boys, works as the maid for a prominent citizen and his family in West Table, Missouri. Her husband is mostly absent, and in 1929, her scandalous, beloved younger sister is one of the forty-two killed in an explosion at the local dance hall. Who is to blame? Mobsters from St. Louis? The embittered local Gypsies? The preacher who railed against the loose morals of the waltzing couples? Or could it have...

Twelve short stories depict people on the fringes of society, including an injured rapist who is cared for by a young girl and a husband who cruelly avenges the murder of his wife's pet.

Novelist Doyle Redmond of California, whose whodunits are getting nowhere, returns to the Ozarks in the hope that a stay in his native land will provide inspiration to achieve fame. He becomes involved in his family's marijuana business, there is a shootout and Redmond heads for jail, his fame assured. By the author of The Ones You Do.

Four different characters forge a friendship in the turmoil of the American Civil War.