Crumbling, empty buildings, a real-estate infrastructure sputtering out, next-to-no tax base for the town and its schools, a population thrown to the mercies of the welfare state... to many of Rocksburg's citizens, this was the bitter legacy of the mid-1980s. A brutal regimen of downsizing had shut down steel production and eliminated two-thirds of the factory's workforce - a policy enforced by steel magnate J. D. Lyons.

If Lyons accomplished his business objectives, he has since paid the ultimate price. For J.D. Lyons has just been found in the trunk of his Jaguar, bent over a bag of golf clubs and sporting a small-calibre bullet wound at the base of his skull.

The list of suspects is the size of the Rocksburg phone book. What begins as a singular homicide suddenly becomes a swath of murderous violence that touches the ranks of the local union hierarchy, threatens public order, and confounds all investigatory logic.

This won't be an easy case for Detective Ruggiero 'Rugs' Carlucci, and it's coming at a tough crossroad in his life. His always difficult mother has officially been deemed a threat to herself and others. And for the first time he finds himself falling in love. More than before, his mind is in a state of full-dress riot. Bringing order and justice to Rugs's world will test all his skill and resolve...even as he tries to part company with misery.

Through the hearts and voices of one small fictional city, K. C. Constantine has created another tour de force - one that touches the American nerve at its most explosive, authentic and surprising.