The vicious murder of a 15-year-old girl shakes the residents of Seward Island, Washington to their very souls. The victim is wealthy, beautiful, and of the sweetest disposition imaginable, and absolutely no one in the tranquil community of Seward Island can imagine the lovely teenager has any enemies who would do her any harm. As the police begin the arduous search for suspects, the murder takes the people of Seward Island somewhere else: into the realm of their darkest prejudices and worst fears, to eventually reveal a very human evil living in their midst.