Dark Currents — Doug Burgess

No one ever talks about what happens in Little Compton...

When David left home three years ago, he never looked back. Now, the only connection to his tiny New England hometown is his grandmother Maggie, whose mind is unraveling as she slowly succumbs to dementia. But when her best friend turns up dead and she may be the sole witness to the crime, David has no choice but to return to a place that never accepted his trans identity and only ever wanted him gone.

Maggie's testimony is shrouded in doubt -- in between moments of lucidity she talks about things that never happened, about apparitions, disappearances, and murders. But are they really only stories? After a man's death sets off a hauntingly familiar chain of events, it seems there's some truth to Maggie's words.

With a body count on the rise, David begrudgingly tunes back into the rural voices of the tight-knit community to seek out the truth. And while David returns home a changed man, he finds that the ghosts of his past have waited for him. He'll have to face them head-on before he can begin to unravel his grandmother's story and finally put to rest the mysteries of this little town, lost in the fog.

Even if no one talks about what happens in Little Compton, the dark currents beneath the silence create baffling crime puzzles for transgender sleuth David to unravel, and promise that the past is never sunk as deep as we think.