Speed makes the teenage bikers feel alive, but they soon find that murder is the fastest way to die. A five-mile stretch of arrow-straight road outside Latchford acts like a magnet to beatnik bikers using the road like a drag strip. When one of the bikers is killed in an accident, most people regard it as an inevitable consequence of the kids using drugs and racing bikes for kicks. But the evidence points to the young man's death being something more sinister than a mere accident and George Gently is drawn into a world populated by disaffected teenagers, with a jazz soundtrack and a background of murder.