Elizabeth Smith

The Sovereignty File Elizabeth Smith

It is the summer of 2004, and pristine antebellum homes, once the refuge of wealthy New Orleanians seeking to escape yellow fever, sit proudly along the Mississippi Gulf Coast. But beyond this tranquil setting and the seductive Gulf breeze, there are secrets, never revealed, that still remain a threat. Following an interview with a U. S. Senator and leading presidential candidate, a young journalist will have cause to wonder if a killer could soon occupy the White House. While Jonathan Burke attempts to link the Mississippi senator to the secret Sovereignty Commission, an agency whose mission was to destroy the entire civil rights movement within the state, he stumbles upon the unsolved murder of a ten-year-old black girl. When he becomes obsessed with solving this thirty-year-old murder, he is forced to examine his past and the real reasons for this obsession. Soon it becomes clear to Jonathan that this is a place where heat still lingers, hate still simmers, and secrets from the past must never be revealed.