Following the brutal shotgun slaying of a local businesswoman and her children, Detective Sergeant Hazel Vernon finds a pair of major suspects in the form of the businesswoman’s ex-husband, who is a man as soulless as the sex-bots in the factory where he works, and the business partner who is hiding far more than her past from the police.Hazel also meets up with ageing comedians, Neal Cooper and Norman Barrel, a pair of old school show business types who were hugely popular thirty years before and who are hoping for a comeback.A nightclub owner with more ex-wives than is good for his bank account and a pair of the stupidest criminals Hazel has ever met muddy the waters of a complex investigation.The detective has to use all her wits to solve this case.