It’s bedlam by the bay.
It’s chaos on the coast.
It’s another dustup in Devil’s Harbor, that quirky Oregon community.
When an image appears scorched into a breaded crab cake some say it’s a miracle. Others say it’s a disaster.
The image draws swarms of pilgrims, trying the patience of residents and stressing the town’s aging sewage treatment system. Facing huge financial penalties, Mayor Henri Trevelle plants portable toilets on every lawn.
Only selling timber from the town trust land can supply funds to save the day, but a tree-sitting activist for hire keeps loggers at bay. When someone takes a chainsaw to his perch, reporter Molly Donvan discovers the fall didn’t kill him—he was poisoned, strangled, and struck with a blunt object.
Who did him in? The mayor? The girlfriend he cheated on? The environmentalist he defrauded? Loggers with their jobs on hold?
Molly delves into the dead man’s past, hoping to untangle a snarl of lies and name the killer before Sheriff Greg Erdman. But others chart stranger courses—her father falls for a shady lady, Henri undertakes an extreme makeover, Adam flees to the forest, Elspeth sees the light, Icky becomes a writer, and Shelley takes bold steps to turn back the tide of tourism.
(Originally released as SOMETIMES A GREAT COMMOTION)