Kira Logan is commissioned to paint four portraits of people in two families. One is of a couple named Carleton and Bonnie Barlow. The other is of the Thornton family, which includes a man named Frank, who is obviously abusive. His wife, Patricia, and their children, Dale and Stephanie, are intimidated by him. All three are victimized directly by Frank. Patricia's clothes and demeanor cover up marks of physical and emotional abuse. She is locked in a situation from which she wants release but is fearful of initiating it.

Kira and Patricia can talk a bit during their portrait sessions, but everyone observing the Thorntons' lives is worried about Patricia and her children. One of the Barlow's sons, Alan, wants to take an active part in liberating Patricia, for whom he seems to have deeper feelings than sympathy. The situation becomes public when Frank is first poisoned then, after his recuperation, shot while driving home. Frank's subsequent cremation after the car goes out of control obliterates some of the evidence.

Andrew has crafted a murder mystery that emphasizes the dynamics of domestic abuse. The situations are interpreted, collectively and individually, by the abuser, his family, his co-workers, Patricia's friends, and Kira. The author is skilled, not only in conveying fear, intimidation, and the mixed feelings engendered by long-term, dysfunctional relationships but in creating situations in which one easily identifies with the characters. Readers are likely to not only have sympathy for Frank's victims but, on some levels, with Frank himself. This work is well worth one's time and attention for its verisimilitude in depicting all too common catastrophes in families and a community's responses to them.

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