Alternates in time between nineteenth-century and contemporary Hawthorn, once a pioneer village beset by strange occurrences and now a strange, isolated small town where sixteen-year-old Harper Spurling unknowingly befriends a serial killer.
Haunted by his mother's death, eighteen-year-old Mack Druneswald roams Balrog County looking for things to burn, staying one step ahead of his grandfather, the mayor, who is investigating the recent spate of arson.
