Perilous Homecoming — Shirley A. Franklin

Michelle Johnson had mixed feelings about leaving England to live with her father's family on their plantation near Mobile, Alabama. There was nothing to keep her in England. After her father's death under unusual circumstances that brought to light his less than respectable "profession," Michelle's mother had succumbed to the leukemia from which she had suffered for several years. But on the other hand, although her grandmother had sent airline tickets, Michelle's knowledge of the rift that had caused her father to leave his boyhood home was sufficient to deter her from expecting a lavish welcome there.

Judging from her cool reception when she arrived at Azalea Hills, the old rift had not yet healed. Michelle found her grandmother aloof and condescending--and strangely reluctant to introduce Michelle to her grandfather, bedridden following a stroke. Her only cousin, Marie, was infuriatingly, almost comically, insufferable; Michelle's aunt and uncle seemed to barely notice her presence; and the mere existence of one of her relatives shocked her into speechlessness. Even blond Neil Marshall, the farm manager and no relation to Michelle, treated her with skeptical remoteness.

As one lazy summer day followed another, and odd events gave way to sinister ones, Michelle realized that something more diabolical than an old family quarrel motivated the perpetrator of the increasingly menacing attacks on her life.