In her secret novel, Harris introduces readers to a small college town in Tennessee called Knolls. Protagonists Nickie Callahan has come back home to roost as she is moving on from a successful modeling career in New York City. The town is a natural choice since it means being reunited with life long friends Mimi and Cully, two siblings whose family founded the local college.

Upon her arrival, Nickie moves in with Mimi in the former home of Mimi's grandmother. They quickly fall into a routine that brings back fond memories of their friendship. This is a perfect situation as it will help Nickie settle in as a student at the college. Everything seems to be going perfect until word comes out that a co-ed has been raped in one of the quiet and beautiful gardens on campus.

Fear quickly spreads throughout campus and Knolls as single women become more and more concerned about their own safety. Mimi and Nickie think they have done everything possible until Nickie wakes up in the middle of the night to find a man standing over her, and she becomes the next victim.

Nickie, her friends, and some of the earlier victims band together to start looking for the rapist in the hopes from stopping him from striking again. This is crucial as the police have very little evidence to help them with their own search. The victims share their own experiences with each other in order to compile a profile in the hopes of creating a lists of suspects, and they do just that when another woman falls victim, and this one ends up being killed in the process. The list of suspects continues to shrink, but will the rapist/murderer be found before Nickie and her friends end up dead?

As with all of Harris' books, quirky characters are at the core, and the result is a perfect example of a cozy set on a Southern college campus. Harris also does a great job of capturing the feel of academic/campus life as the characters weave themselves together throughout the course of the novel. There is no shortage of suspense and problem solving for our detective.

This wasn't the strongest of mystery novels, but it was interesting. My biggest problem was a subplot in which Nickie finally gets to develop a relationship with an old high school crush. It just seems a bit out of place considering the crime. Somehow, I don't think most women who are raped find themselves in sexually active relationships mere weeks after they were brutalized ... even if she has known the guy for years.

All-in-all, it was a pretty good read.