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.
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.