After a horrific murder, a sleuthing English teacher will need a Christmas miracle to prove a condemned man innocent.

Colourful Christmas lights dapple the family homes in the idyllic lakeside town of Sweet Haven when Jennifer Dean, a young librarian at the local elementary school, is brutally murdered. There are witnesses and her boyfriend Travis Blake confesses to the crime... but something doesn't add up. Blake is a third generation Army Ranger, awarded the Silver Star for his heroism in Afghanistan - how could a beloved son of this tight-knit community commit such a grisly deed?

Sweet Haven is a community of military families, so no one wants to investigate a war hero. In steps Cameron Winter, a rugged and lonesome English professor haunted by the ghosts of his own Christmas past, whose former lover asks him to prove Blake innocent. The Sweet Haven murder echoes a horrific Yuletide memory from Winter's youth, and he knows the case is even darker than it seems. If he can solve this small-town mystery, just maybe he can find peace from his inner demons too.