Eric Loesch, a private man with a shadowy past, returns to his hometown in rural New York, where he purchases a dilapidated house that he begins to renovate with steely determination. The adjacent woods on his property seem to beckon him, and he soon discovers a Gothic castle at the center of his land that he appears not to own. Loesch looks for an explanation, and the reader is drawn into a ''terrifying and psychologically complex mystery signaling an important American writer in full command of his powers.''