Fifty–something community college professor and amateur sleuth Bel Barrett is at it again. When Dom Tomaselli, a student from her memoir–writing class for senior citizens, shows up dead, she agrees to investigate whether his fall from a rooftop was an accident––or murder. But with her aged mother so depressed that she can't even make her weekly trips to Atlantic City, and with her wedding to her boyfriend Sal coming up, she hardly has time for anything, let alone sleuthing. So with the help of Dom's daughter Flora, Bel determines that Dom's inveterate gambler brother–in–law, who owed him money, is the primary suspect. But could an extortion plot and a long–ago arson case also be central to the old man's demise? With the help of her best pals from the community college, Bel weaves together the different strands of one of the most baffling cases she's ever seen...and discovers that the history of her beloved Hoboken is far more sordid than she'd ever imagined.