After 15 years away, Kate Hamilton never expected to end up back in her hometown of Asheboro, Maryland, full time. And she definitely didn't expect to be leading the charge of recreating the town as a Victorian village and tourist attraction. But as unexpected as the circumstances are, Kate is ready to tackle them.

The town, on the other hand, is going to take some convincing. Ever since Henry Barton's shovel factory closed down, it's started to seem like there are more tumbleweeds than tourists rolling down Main Street. Kate's ideas are good, but ambitious - and her friends and neighbors are worried that finding the money for them would push the town even further into debt.

Luckily, Kate and historian Joshua Wainwright may have come up with a solution. The Barton mansion, meant to be the centerpiece of the Victorian village, has proven to be a veritable goldmine of documents about the town's 19th-century history, and Kate is convinced the papers hide something of value. When a dead body turns up in the town library - mere hours before the documents were meant to arrive there themselves - Kate begins to worry that the papers spell danger instead of dollars. It seems that someone doesn't want these forgotten secrets coming to light, and they'll do whatever it takes to keep Kate quiet....