Southern Latitudes — Stephen J. Clark

Nelson Ingram left Alabama a young man full of promise and ambition, with dreams of seeing the world. Now a burnt-out, disillusioned reporter, he has come back to the one place he's avoided for most of his adult life: his backwater hometown of Litchfield. And, unfortunately, it's exactly how he left it...

When a black man is found lynched one night, reporter Nelson Ingram and the rest of Litchfield are ready to chalk it up as the work of the Ku Klux Klan. But when a bullet wound is found in the back of the victim's head, the case turns into something much more complex, but just as sinister.

The appearance of a second body raises the stakes even higher. With incompetent policemen and an editor who's more interested in the local PTA meetings, Nelson realizes that he may be the only one intent on finding the truth. But it's going to take a lot more than his renewed sense of purpose to uncover the secrets of this old Southern town...