Misfit Blues is a novella of love and crime, Goodbye, Columbus meets The Friends of Eddie Coyle... It's both an ill-fated love story (she's already engaged, he's not quite in her class) and a suspenseful mystery set on Martha's Vineyard in the summer of 1989. Housepainter Tommy Shakespear, a Golden Gloves boxer and Dartmouth B-school dropout, has to locate and persuade a terrified witness to return to Boston from the Vineyard, where she's been in hiding. She's the only one who can testify to the innocence of her not-so-innocent boyfriend, charged with attempted murder and grievous bodily assault. Meanwhile, a slumlord's hired thugs (who are ex-cops and guilty of the crime) are also trying to track her down to eliminate the problem.