You can choose your friends, but you can't choose your family. You can though move two thousand miles away and hope they don't come to visit. Unfortunately, for Lucy Mathews that only works for so long.

Lucy has a perfect week planned. The kind of week that includes a romantic dinner with her cowboy detective boyfriend, big dollar sales to the visiting Beef Ranchers Association and their wives, and maybe a relaxing holiday weekend at home with her Alaskan malamute, Kiska.

What she doesn't have planned is a visit from her animal activist brother, his pet goose, Pauline, and his neon yellow van.

Lucy's plans quickly go to the birds. First, her date is interrupted by brother and goose. Second she discovers a dead body, under her brother's van. Then, when her brother gets arrested for the murder, the worst thing imaginable happens, Lucy's mother finds out.

Not only is Lucy is left in charge of babysitting the recalcitrant goose, but her mother is threatening to come to Montana herself to solve the murder. Lucy has no choice but to dive into the investigation, and find the real murderer before her brother is put away for good.