Morphed is a story of everyday life, meaning a story of sex, family, pornography, murder, the law, and local politics. It takes place in South Susquehanna, a stuffy suburb of Albany-and in Albany itself, once a Dutch colony and then a prosperous and powerful city in upstate New York well into the 20th century, now kept on life support by a bloated state government and the parasites that live (and die) on the host. To most, the events of life appear blown about like dry leaves on an autumn road. But in the invisible but real world where awful things happen that we don't want to see, there is little that is truly random. Harry Nieman is a retired New York City cop. He's an upstate lawyer with a history as a state criminal justice executive and a mostly solitary life as a small-time attorney making a small-time living doing mortgage closings and defending DWI summons in local courts. He's bored and confused. To himself, Harry seems a man on the way down.

Others who know him would probably agree. One day he stumbles into a woman from his past work life in Albany who he barely remembers. But she remembers him. They quickly fall into bed and into the life of her dysfunctional family, into a tangled story of pornography, internet blackmail, and murder with catastrophic consequences. Among other late-life lessons, Harry learns or relearns that neat and tidy do not apply to money, family, sex, or murder. Didn't Dashiell Hammett say somewhere that murders are not mathematical problems? Harry finds dysfunction everywhere he looks and goes, and it finds him. In the end, he is told he has undergone a metamorphosis. He discovers in himself a new avidity about money.

And perhaps new ways for extracting big bucks from clients who need his skills, both inside and outside the law. Not without risk-Harry is warned by a lawyer with whose client he is working: Watch closely, Harry, and buckle up?these others are in for an ugly surprise. My client is one smart, nasty motherfucker.