Super-megastore PyeMart is prepping a job site for a new store in the river town of Butternut Falls, Minnesota, when a bomb goes off in the company's headquarters in Michigan. Three weeks later, a similar explosion occurs in the construction trailer at the new PyeMart site inside the Butternut Falls city limits. Two people are dead and several injured, so the ATF becomes involved. And they immediately contact the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension for a local liaison in Butternut Falls. It doesn't take long for the head of the BCA to decide that Virgil Flowers is the perfect man for the job.

As Virgil's investigation progresses, he has a multitude of suspects to deal with from the local merchants, who will lose business when PyeMart opens up, to the environmentalists, who fear ecological disaster from the store's location near the Butternut River. His frustration eventually leads to a surprising motive, as well as a shocking murderer.

John Sandford has done it again -- given Virgil Flowers an exciting, suspenseful and puzzling case to solve that proves he's not an investigator to mess with. Bits of humor and witty dialog are interspersed with a compelling narrative to make this another winner in the Virgil Flowers series.

Book Summary

The superstore chain PyeMart has its sights set on a Minnesota river town, but two very angry groups want to stop it: local merchants, fearing for their businesses, and environmentalists, predicting ecological disaster. The protests don't seem to be slowing the project, though, until someone decides to take matters into his own hands.

The first bomb goes off on the top floor of PyeMart's headquarters. The second one explodes at the construction site itself. The blasts are meant to inflict maximum damage - and they do. Who's behind the bombs, and how far will they go? It's Virgil Flowers's job to find out . . . before more people get killed.