Twenty-five year old postdoc Edwina Goodman is a physics instructor at Cushing College, an Ivy League school in the beautiful New England town of New Guilford. She is unassuming, brilliant, guileless, and engaging -- and most of all, endlessly curious about the world around her. Edwina does some of her best thinking while river kayaking and riding her bike. She lives alone in a cozy little house in the woods heated by a wood-burning stove, on Canaan Farm Road in New Guilford.
Distinguished Professor of Physics Alan Sidebottom travels from Cambridge University to teach at Cushing College for a semester. Within a few days of his arrival at the college he is found dead in his digs. The manner of his death is not immediately clear, but the cause is an apparent heart attack. Handsome young detective William Tenney of the New Guilford Police investigates the professor's death. He gradually discovers there is no shortage of motives, ill-will, or secrets among the members the physics department toward the extravagant and eccentric Professor Sidebottom, who had a well-earned reputation as a philanderer and all-around 'bad boy of physics'.
Edwina is dogged by guilty feelings over Professor Sidebottom's death. He died shortly after having dinner with her, and she keeps wondering if she might have prevented his death by spending more time with him that night. But the professor had become drunk and tiresome at dinner, and Edwina cut the evening short and bicycled home. In the wake of his demise, she is compelled to ferret out every possible snippet of information about his death, and to follow up every lead -- she turns out to be so deft at connecting all the dots, Detective William Tenney takes her on as a sidekick in the investigation. The two find that they are like-minded and compatible, but as self-sufficient, unregenerate loners, they find it difficult navigating their mutual attraction.