It’s August 30, and Ellery Corcoran and her twin brother, Ezra, arrive at the Burlington, Vermont, airport to discover that Ellery’s suitcase is missing. The two are moving from Los Angeles to Echo Ridge, Vermont, to live with their Nana (their grandmother) because their mother, Sadie, has been put into court-appointed rehab after crashing her car while high on opioids. After filling out the paperwork for the missing bag, Ellery and Ezra are picked up by Nana and Melanie Kilduff, a neighbor and long-time friend of the family. Melanie’s teenage daughter, Lacey Kilduff, was found strangled to death five years ago at Murderland, a Halloween theme park in town, in a case that became famous, particularly because Echo Ridge is the site of another prominent disappearance: that of Sarah Corcoran, Sadie’s twin sister.

On the drive to Echo Ridge, which is a small, rural town that will be the twins’ new home, it starts hailing. They pull over, and Ellery reflects on Nana’s new role as their guardian. The twins don’t know their Nana, but they had nowhere else to go, as they don’t know their father and have no other relatives. The hail subsides, and the four of them arrive at Echo Ridge but stop short of town when they see something shocking: There’s a dead man lying in the road.