'The gate of Hell is open 24/7. There's no problem finding the way down,' as unsuccessful writer Eddie Milsom discovers. Sex with the wife of Brimswell's richest man was never going to be safe. But shagging Cordelia Pierrepont has proved more dangerous than he could possibly imagine. Now Charles Pierrepont is dead and Eddie has to think fast to invent his get-out-of -jail-free card.

The subsequent public discovery of the brutal murder stirs up no end the usually calm surface of Brimswell society. It isn't the kind of thing that should happen in a West-country town famed for its Georgian heritage and thermal springs, and more accustomed to tourism than terrorism. Particularly not now when the spa is being expensively revived with the backing of the murdered man's company.

The complications don't end there. Eddie has had his hand in other tricky things, which he's left to blow up in the face of his long-suffering girl-friend Helen. Her life is about to change beyond recognition as her fate becomes bound up with another deceased Brimswell resident, the Regency novelist Hester Philips. As the less than glorious past of the town is gradually unearthed, more lives are lost before it all ends with a bang.