Kate Barry, 80 years old, healthy and vigorous but subject to occasional blackout episodes, has become a resident of Whispering Pines, an assisted living facility. She faces the boring routine of her new life with some trepidation. When the police make little progress investigating the mysterious deaths of two other residents, Kate relishes conferring with her new friend Mac to exercise curiosity, discreet inquiry, and contacts with a reporter and a medical examiner and to assemble an unlikely hodgepodge of in-house gossip, surmise, and facts that points to the identity of a murderer. Kate exchanges boredom for the risk of deadly danger as their findings zero in. Police learn a lesson, namely, that old age and disability do not diminish powers of observation and logic.