Ariel Quigley is a young English instructor who talks to ghosts and has precognitive dreams that help her to solve mysteries. In the first book she finds herself embroiled in an abortive bombing, a suspicious death, a car accident that is no accident, and a hurricane. (Is nature a terrorist agent?) She does Tarot readings for fun, but learns a lot about the people around her from the cards. And in the course of unraveling the clues she also learns the truth about the death of a slave who died before the Civil Warβfrom the ghost herself.