Jaynie Turner, divorced, beautiful, bossy and widely loathed, announces to anyone who cares to listen that she is doing historical research into the village of Clerehaven and its residents. Very soon after this announcement she is found dead in a derelict building. Who could want to kill Jaynie? It had to be someone who had secrets to hide - secrets which Jaynie in her blundering manner came close to discovering. But what secrets can there be in such a small community as Clerehaven? This is the task facing inspector Sheldon Hunter and his loyal, lovestruck sidekick Annette - and once they start to dig deeper into Clerehaven's history they soon discover that Jaynle's is not the first murder in this seemingly peaceful village...