Sandford, John

In Southeast Minnesota, down on the Mississippi, a school board meeting is coming to an end. The board chairman announces that the rest of the meeting will be closed, due to personnel issues. "Issues" is correct. The proposal up for a vote before them is whether to authorize the killing of a local reporter. The vote is four to one in favor. Meanwhile, not far away, Virgil Flowers is helping out a friend by looking into a dognapping, which seems to be turning into something much bigger and uglier; a team of dog-nappers supplying medical labs, when he gets a call from Lucas Davenport. A murdered body has been found, and the victim is a local reporter.

Class reunions: a time for memories; good, bad, and, as Virgil Flowers is about to find out, deadly. Virgil knows the town of Trippton, Minnesota, a little too well. A few years back, he investigated the corrupt, and as it turned out, homicidal, local school board, and now the town's back in view with more alarming news: A woman's been found dead, frozen in a block of ice. There's a possibility that it might be connected to a high school class of twenty years ago that has a mid-winter reunion coming up, and so, wrapping his coat a little tighter, Virgil begins to dig into twenty years' worth of traumas, feuds, and bad blood. In the process, one thing becomes increasingly clear to him. It's true what they say: High school is murder.

Minnesota cop Virgil Flowers teams up with an Israeli cop who is tailing a man who has smuggled out an extraordinary relic, a copper scroll revealing startling details about the man known as King Solomon. Problems mount when teams of murderous bad guys believe Virgil and the woman cop are getting in their way of claiming the relic for themselves.

The first storm comes from, of all places, the Minnesota zoo. Two large, and very rare, Amur tigers have vanished from their cage, and authorities are worried sick that they've been stolen for their body parts. Traditional Chinese medicine prizes those parts for home remedies, and people will do extreme things to get what they need. Some of them are a great deal more extreme than others, as Virgil is about to find out.

At the local state university, two feuding departments have faced off on the battleground of PC culture. Each carries their views to extremes that may seem absurd, but highly educated people of sound mind and good intentions can reasonably disagree, right? Then someone winds up dead, and Virgil Flowers is brought in to investigate. He soon comes to realize he's dealing with people who, on this one particular issue, are functionally crazy. Among this group of wildly impassioned, diametrically opposed zealots lurks a killer, and it will be up to Virgil to sort the murderer from the mere maniacs.

Virgil Flowers, an investigator with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, is pulled from a fishing tournament to take the case of a murder at a nearby resort for women only, and his queries reveal a second murder the year before, and the very real possibility of a third about to happen.

Follow an oak leaf's travels on an autumn breeze.

Minneapolis police lieutenant Lucas Davenport teams up with New York cop Lily Rothenberg to investigate when a top FBI official is targeted by a band of Native Americans seeking revenge for an attack on one of their young women.

"Teen activist Shay and her brother Odin are closing in on Singular Corp. and ready to shut down the evil conglomerate once and for all"--Provided by publisher.