Compulsion

Forensic psychiatrist Frank Clevenger is no stranger to the darkest corners of the mind, though his own past has left wounds of its own. A call from the police chief on Nantucket pulls him into a case that cuts close to home: the five-month-old daughter of wealthy businessman Darwin Bishop has been killed in her crib. Authorities quickly look to Billy, the troubled, sociopathic adopted son of the family, but even Clevenger cannot see why a boy would harm an infant. Julia Bishop, the family's striking wife, seems to hold something back, and so does the couple's other son, who is hiding serious secrets of his own.

As Clevenger probes the Bishops' fractured emotional world, he finds himself drawn to Julia, a connection that complicates an already tangled investigation. The family's history is tied to a web of psychological and sexual dysfunction, and the deeper he goes, the more it entangles him. His own buried demons begin to surface just as he must outthink a dangerous killer, and every step forward risks pulling him further in.