When freshman Trixie Stone accuses her ex-boyfriend Jason Underhill of raping her, everyone is quick to take his side when he claims their intercourse was consensual. Trixie's parents, Daniel, a mild mannered comic book artist from a harsh background, and Laura, a college professor sleeping with one of her students, become involved, and Jason, whose life is supposedly ruined, leaps from a bridge. Although first presumed to be suicide, Trixie is suspected of pushing him, and so she flees to the Yup'ik region of Alaska where her father grew up, and Daniel and Laura follow.
At the end of the book, Laura confesses to Daniel that she was there when Jason died. Jason (who was drunk) came lunging at her because he thought she was Trixie. Laura pushed him off the bridge but he held on. Laura reached to his hand but then let go, thus revealing that Trixie is innocent but shows Laura is not. The book concludes with the final chapter of Daniel's comic showing a father reunited with his daughter after saving her from hell.
The main plot and subplots are juxtaposed throughout the book with Daniel's latest comic, The Tenth Circle, which parallels Daniel's life.
