John Deal's old friend Arch Dolan, owner of Miami's premier independent bookstore, is assassinated just days after the announcement that bookselling conglomerate Haskell & Monroe will open its biggest superstore yet across the street from Arch's shop. Clutched in the dead man's fist is a tract from the Reverend James Ray Willis, the suave, arch-conservative, multimillionaire preacher. Determined to bring his friend's murderer to justice, Deal uncovers the good reverend's large cache of hidden agendas, which, chillingly, include a plan to gain a stranglehold on the media-from books to the Internet. Rekindling his old partnership with his beautiful, troubled ex-wife, Janice, Deal strikes out for Willis's snowbound "maha headquarters " just as a pair of down-home assassins close in for an icy kill.