Virgil Colvin, a retired homicide detective, leaves his hometown Chicago to resurrect his honeymoon memories with his dead wife in Ithaca, Greece. There, he befriends the Vathy police chief, Costas Pantakalas, over stories of a shared profession and countless cups of ouzo.
One day, Virgil wakes to the violent tremors of the earth to find Ithaca has just had an earth quake. But that is not the only unusual occurrence. In the city's public square, at the feet of Odysseus, someone has dumped the body of a British tourist in the small hours of the morning. He ran to the ends of the earth to escape his former life, but murder had other plans for Virgil Colvin. Together, Virgil and Costas join forces to track down a killer. But in their quest to find the murderer, will they unearth an even more astounding secret?