Nick Framingham is still reeling from the recent death of his childhood best friend, the writer Rob Castor, who committed suicide after killing his ex-girlfriend in Manhattan. Rob's death unleashes a series of unexpected revelations in the lives of his friends and family in upstate New York. Nick's own marriage to his college sweetheart, Lucy, begins to unravel as he struggles to understand what drove Rob to murder. Rekindling an old relationship with his first love, Belinda, Rob's volatile and beautiful sister, Nick begins to retrace not only Rob's last days but also their shared childhood, looking for clues to explain his friend's actions. As he begins to re-evaluate his own life and his past, a fault line opens up beneath him, leading him all the way to the book's startling conclusion.