A campus stabbing that is not what it seems .When a gifted, handsome Armidale University student is mysteriously stabbed from behind, detectives have almost no clues and no obvious motive. DI Emily Sanderson - calm, controlled and polite - leads a small team of police assembled to solve the case. Tedious investigative police work, the results of various forensic tests, and a little luck, eventually lead to the identification and punishment of the attacker. As the investigation proceeds, the lives of a number of the people associated with the crime - even some of the police - are changed dramatically. At the climax, a number of other, hitherto unresolved cases are finalised. Justice is eventually achieved, and in an epilogue, we learn what subsequently happened in the lives of the major participants.