After years of struggling to write following the deaths of his wife and son, English professor Connor Nye publishes his first novel, a thriller about the murder of a young woman. There's just one problem: Connor didn't write the book—his missing student did. And then she appears on his doorstep, alive and well, threatening to expose him. Worse yet, the police insist details in the novel implicate him in an unsolved murder. Now Connor must admit he didn't write the book and lose his job or keep up the lie and risk everything. When another murder occurs, Connor can clear his name by unraveling the horrifying secrets buried in his student's manuscript.