Author Description

There was just something about small town America in the 1960's, especially Ohio farm country, that made one proud to have grown up there. Clean air, close knit families with happy kids and unwavering pride in the community. Everyone knew everyone, never hesitated to help a neighbor in need and no one bothered to lock their doors at night. All that changed, at least for a while, in the spring of 1968. Three members of a local family, father, mother and daughter were viciously attacked and killed in their home in the middle of the night. The only surviving member of the family, a 17-year-old boy discovered the bodies. After what seemed like only a few weeks, the investigation into the matter was mysteriously dropped and any questions regarding the matter were sternly discouraged. Months passed, then years and life simply returned to normal. For most of the residents at the time, the murders were nothing more than a bizarre aberration on an otherwise unblemished reputation of the peaceful village and better off buried in the past. Ellen Richardson, a former classmate of the sole survivor, never understood why so little had been done to find the killer. Returning to her childhood home thirty years later for a high school reunion, she's reminded of the same unsettling questions that had nagged her at the time and were never answered. While looking through some old papers in the local library, she runs across an article that brings the whole story flooding back. Her curiosity piqued, she hunts for more information. Questioning local authorities only leads to frustration. They refuse to answer Ellen's questions, and vehemently discourage her from pursuing the matter further. Undeterred, and stubbornly ignoring pressure from the police department, she continues the investigation on her own. When old classmates begin to die, she discovers that her dogged persistence has placed her directly in the killer's sights. What begins as a casual search for historic information soon