Synopsis: One Dead Tomato

Things have been chaotic lately in the small Pacific Northwest town of Nenamooks, Washington. After a contentious and divisive trial, the popular young scion of one of the town’s founding families was put behind bars for wife-battering. The charismatic and enterprising preacher at Saghaly Evangelical Church is making headlines - and money - with his latest crusade; this time, it’s against Halloween and Daylight Savings Time. And the local Anti-Bullying League is kicking off the new school year with a protest march down Main Street, which will be held whether or not they can get a permit.

Catherine “Tandy” Akers, manager of Nenamooks Books, has just passed her 39th birthday and is having to come to terms with the facts of her life, including her persistent and expanding intuitive abilities. She’s also been lending a shoulder to her best friend, owner of the town’s real estate agency, who’s experiencing some personal upheavals of her own.

All in all, as the short, hot summer comes to an end, folks in Nenamooks are feeling pretty unsettled.

Then late one August evening, the body of Tony Pederson, county health & social services director, is found impaled on a tomato stake at the local community garden. The sheriff thinks it was an accident, but there are plenty of people who had cause to be upset with Tony’s aggressive, no-nonsense approach to his job. In addition, witnesses report seeing car headlights leave the garden’s parking lot shortly before the gruesome discovery. After Tandy learns that she has a personal connection to the murdered man, she is drawn into investigating the crime, at first by herself and later with the assistance of Tony’s brother-in-law.

Before it’s over, Nenamooksians are going to find themselves feeling a lot more unsettled, and a couple more will be dead.