Eric Loesch, a private man with a shadowy past, returns to his hometown in rural New York where he purchases a dilapidated house that he begins to renovate with steely determination. The adjacent woods on the property seem to beckon him and he soon discovers a gothic castle at the centre of his land that he appears not to own. As Loesch looks for an explanation, the reader is drawn into a taut and mesmerising story that reveals a great deal not just about one man's past, but about America's recent military adventures.