Realtor Diana Rittenhouse has survived a nasty divorce and her career has stalled, so she moves her art collection, her foul-mouthed parrot, and Viv, her testy elderly mother, from urban Philadelphia to rural North Carolina for a fresh start. Diana's mother had grown up in that part of North Carolina back when it was forest and farmland, before backhoes raped the red soil and turned an old culture upside down. For Viv, the move means coming home. for Diana, a confirmed Yankee, the change is frightening. As a new associate at Crawford Realty, Diana anticipates making an easy living selling upscale lake properties and enjoying a simpler life style. Instead, her new home seems like a foreign country, where invading newcomers from all over the nation are fast disrupting a proud society. Fortunes are made overnight, and Diana lands squarely in the middle of a power struggle. Her very first client, land-rich Jedidiah Porter, is murdered, and Diana becomes the prime suspect. As she seeks the real killer, Diana is dragged into a deadly triangle of greed and violence. New friends are outnumbered by new enemies, and in the midst of turmoil, Diana encounters the last thing she expects...a second chance at love. But will she live to enjoy it?