Independent Bones

PI Sarah Booth Delaney and her best friend and business partner, Tinkie Richmond, attend the grand opening for a park in Zinnia, MS, where the speaker, Dr. Alala Diakos, opines that men who abuse women “should be exterminated.” The event turns violent when domestic abuser Curtis Miller is attacked by a mob of women. He’s later shot to death, and Alala is questioned. She hires Sarah Booth and Tinkie because this is the third time a man Alala knows has been shot and killed. They discover a local group of men affiliated with a national campaign to limit women’s economic, educational, and medical choices. Sarah Booth knows she can’t keep Tinkie from the case, but she wants to limit her exposure to possible violence: Tinkie is eight and a half months pregnant, and Sarah Booth is more worried for her safety than Alala’s.