Welcome to Three Pines, where the cruellest month is about to deliver on its threat. It's spring in the tiny, forgotten village; buds are on the trees and the first flowers are struggling through the newly thawed earth. However, not everything is meant to return to life... When some villagers decide to celebrate Easter with a séance at the old Hadley house, one of their party dies of fright. Was this a natural death, or was it a murder? Brilliant, compassionate Chief Inspector Armand Gamache is called to investigate, and the case will force him to face his own ghosts as well as those of a seemingly idyllic town where relationships are far more dangerous than they seem.